Page:History of California, Volume 3 (Bancroft).djvu/275

Rh may be added, as probably accurate, the statements of several Californians, to the effect that the site selected was where Vallejo's settlers and the Solano neophytes had already erected some rude buildings, that the new place was named Santa Anna y Farías, in honor of the president and vice-president of Mexico, and that the settlement was abandoned next year, because the colonists refused to venture into a country of hostile Indians.

An amusing episode of this year's history was a charge of conspiracy against "those irreconcilable foes of our country, Captain Don José de la Guerra y Noriega, Fr. Narciso Duran, Fr. Tomás Esténega, and Sergeant José Antonio Pico." The revelation reached the capital May 26th by a special messenger, who brought letters from Angel Ramirez, Antonio M. Lugo, and Padre Blas Ordaz, to the effect that Duran and Guerra had ridiculed often the federal system, that mysterious papers had been signed, that money had been transferred from San Gabriel to Santa Bárbara, and that the soldier Romero had been made to sign a paper by Pico without knowing its purport. Figueroa hastened to convene the diputacion in secret session to consider the momentous news. All the members were