Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 7.pdf/312

306 table and bedsteads. Their cooking utensils and diet are rough and simple, as their furniture; even those who are not of the lowest grade live almost entirely on beef; and after the manner of their brother aborigines, a wooden stake, sharpened at both ends so as to form a spit, answers the purpose of pot and platter.

The principal business of all classes is attending to animals; there are some, however, who cultivate small patches of ground. In doing this they use plows of the most simple and primitive style. Their plows are nothing more than the fork of a tree, so cut and trimmed that one of the prongs answers as a beam, by which it is drawn, the other prong is the plow itself, and the main stem, with some trimming, makes the handle. The Spaniards do not, however, often engage in laborious exercise. They are generally content with merely living; and in a country possessed of so mild a climate as California has, it requires very little exertion to live. Where labor must be performed they usually employ the Indians, who are obtained for a mere nominal compensation. In fact a great many of the Indians in California are little else than slaves.

A wheeled carriage is seldom used by a Californian; a horse and rope answers his purpose. Often when he goes to any of the towns to purchase an article, he fastens his money—which is a bullock's hide—to one end of his lasso, and then mounting his horse, winds the other end around the horn of his saddle, and putting spurs, dashes off at a furious rate, over hill and plain, with or without a road, to the town.

Their saddles, which are made very strong, are loaded with various trappings, have large heavy wooden stirrups, and altogether, frequently weigh sixty or seventy pounds. The plan of the saddle tree is an excellent one, and the saddles are very safe and pleasant for the rider,