Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 37.djvu/494

478 and a considerable revenue derived from the sale of such products to the presidios. All the agricultural and manufacturing work was performed by the Indians. Each mission had a large flock of sheep, the eleven missions in 1800 possessing eighty-six thousand. The Indians sheared the wool, and spun and wove if into blankets and coarse fabrics for clothing. They also made



soap, and tanned the skins and hides; they were the shoemakers and saddlers, the carpenters and blacksmiths.

With respect to the number of hours the neophytes were compelled to labor, there seems to be some doubt. In reply to the commandant's charge that the neophytes were compelled to work from six to nine hours a day, with extra work on special occasions