Genevra Sisson Snedden

“ Pantu stood by a table, and every time a shearer brought a fleece to the table, Pantu gave him a five-cent piece.
Soon Yappa came out also to watch the shearing, but as hour after hour went by, the sun rose higher and higher, and the air grew hot and was filled with dust. By and by Yappa said, “I’m tired of watching them, Shecol. Let’s go and build a brush hut for ourselves with some of the willow branches that were left over from the shearers’ huts.”
“All right,” said Shecol. “We’ll play that we are wild Indians living out on a rancheria as grandpa used to do.” ”

“ Some of the strange Indians hurried into the hut and brought out Ama, Heema, and Alachu and took them off. The others stayed to fight.
Next day they took Massea and his family out to the middle of their rancheria. The Indians who had captured them were going to torture them.
Suddenly a man in a long gray gown stood among them. It was Father Pena, and he was holding up a cross.
He said, “My children, what are you doing? Do you know that it is wrong for you to torture your neighbors? Let them go.” ”

“ He began to jump around the hut, blowing on the reed meanwhile. As he gave an extra big jump, he lit on the edge of one of the baskets, tipped it over, and spilled the clams in it all over the ground.
“I wish you would be more quiet, like Docas,” said Ama.
“Never mind, I’ll pick up the clams,” said Heema, hurrying to get the clams back into the basket again. “Docas wants to be a man. You can’t have much fun with him these days,” he said.
Just as he put the last clam back, Docas and Massea came in sight, and Heema ran to meet them. ”

“ The herders let the cattle run round and round as long as they liked, but by and by the cattle got so dusty and tired and dizzy that they stopped running of their own accord. The herders then drove them back again, for they were no longer afraid.
When the cattle were safely back, Oshda said, “We must keep singing or whistling all night. That will let the cattle know that some one is near them, and they will not be so easily frightened.” ”

“ Massea went around with a scraper and scraped the other Indians.
By and by the fire went down, and Docas went off to play. By that time the Indians were tired out.
“Look at them! There they go!” cried Docas to Heema. Massea and the other men had jumped over the fire at the door and were running down to the river.
Heema and Alachu came running.
“Now father’s in the water!” cried Docas. A moment later he added, “See, he has come up out of the river. They are going to lie down in the sun to get warm and dry again. Let’s go down and play in the sun near them.” ”

“ WHEN DOCAS LIVED WITH DON SECUNDINI ROBLES
WASH-DAY “WE must soap the ox-cart well to-night, Occano,” said Oshda to his oldest son.
“What does the Señor Robles want us to do to-morrow?” asked Occano.
“It is not the Señor that wants us to-morrow. It is the Señora. Now that the sun has come again, we are all going to start for the creek very early in the morning to have a wash-day,” said Oshda.
Next morning, before it was daylight, the oxen were yoked to the cart, and lunch was stowed away inside. Then Donna Maria, as they called the Señora Robles, climbed into the cart with her five children. ”

“ The shearers stayed several days longer, but the children did not watch them any more, for they were taking care of their pet lamb.
THE BARBECUE “WHERE’S father?” asked Yappa of her mother one afternoon.
“Gone off with Don Secundini to dig the pits for the barbecue,” answered Putsha.
“And where’s Shecol?”
“He has gone with them,” said Putsha. “But we must go to work, for we have bread to make and corn to get ready for tortillas to-day. The corn is all ready for you to grind. It has been soaked in the limewater. Begin to grind it while I build a fire in the oven.” ”

“ Docas could run fast, so he reached Apa long before Heema did.
“Why are the people putting grass down in a circle?” asked Heema, as the three boys walked into the village.
“That’s where they dance, and they want it to be soft so that they can lie down when they get tired,” answered Docas.
It was dark before all the invited people had come, so they all had supper and went to bed.
[35] Next morning the dancing began. Massea stood on one side and stamped on a hollow log, while the women and the other men made one big circle, and swayed back and forth, singing as they danced. ”

“ Don Secundini
[142] “I could put him on a blanket on the ground and tie the blanket to my saddle with a lasso, the way Antonio does with his little brother,” said Pedro. “Run off and tell your mother while I get the blanket,” continued Pedro.
In a few minutes they had started. At first Pedro went very slowly and carefully, for fear Shecol would tumble off, but after a little, Shecol said, “You may go faster if you like. I can stick on all right.” So Pedro let his horse begin to gallop. ”

“ When everything was ready, Occano and some of the other drivers pushed the oxen with the ends of their long poles, and they began to move slowly away. The Indians walked along by the sides of the carts just as they did on wash-day, but this time all the men went as well as the [137] women. Most of the men rode on horseback. One man played a violin, while another man rode behind him to guide the horse.
When they came to the place where the barbecue was to be held, Shecol took Yappa all round and showed her the meat cooking. As they walked along they saw Oshda. ”

“ Father Catala was in charge of the Mission now, for Father Pena was dead.
Father Catala said to Docas, “We must get our hides and tallow over to Monterey. We want them to be ready for the next ship that comes to the coast to trade. Will you not begin to haul them within the next few days?”
“Yes, Father,” said Docas. “But the cart I have been using has such a big axle hole in the wheel that I can hardly use it. The axle has worn the hole very large.”
“Make some new wheels, and take some of the men and begin hauling the hides. We must have them down there by the time the ship comes.” ”

“ DOCAS IN A FIGHT A FEW days after this visit to the red hill, Massea and his family saw some white men coming into the rancheria. Three of them were riding on animals very much like those ridden by Portola’s men; but these were not mules—they were horses.
Each man wore a cloak of padded deerskin. Arrows could not go through these cloaks, so the white men always wore them. Sometimes the Indians shot arrows at them, but when they came to this rancheria the Indians did not try to hurt [53] them. They gave the white men some acorn mush to eat. ”

“ One of the men was Father Pena, who had come into their valley to start a new mission.
He went about ten miles farther south. There he started the new mission, and called it Santa Clara, after a very good and beautiful woman.
One day, a few weeks later, Massea got into a quarrel with some Indians from another rancheria, about some deer they had trapped. That night Docas heard something go “thud” by the side of his head while he was asleep. He put out his hand and felt an arrow sticking in the ground beside the tule mat on which he was sleeping.
“Some one is shooting at us,” he shouted. ”

“ They picked up their deer and went off toward the ocean. Massea followed a little way behind until he saw that they were going down the mountains. Then he came back to where he had left his deer, and carried it down to the Indian rancheria. You can imagine how surprised the Indians were when he told them what he had seen.
A few days later, Docas and some of the other Indian boys were playing at the edge of the camp, when Docas heard a noise and looked up.
“Look! What’s that queer animal coming toward us?” he said.
“It has two heads!” exclaimed Heema. ”

“ Massea and Docas did not say anything. By and by he said, “The fathers have been kind to us, so I have gone to live with them. I am a Mission Indian now.” After this Massea and Docas asked him many questions about how they lived.
Before he went away, Massea said to him, “I think I should like to be a Mission Indian. Are not any of the fathers coming over across the mountains?”
[52] The strange Indian from Monterey said, “Yes, a little while ago a new father, called Father Pena, came to our Mission. He soon started over the mountains to begin a new Mission. ”

“ Alachu looked up at the ridgepole, then she looked at the tiles.
“They’ll not reach from the ridgepole to the wall. They will fall through,” said she.
“Not when we get ready to put them on,” said Docas.
Massea had brought down from the mountains a great many smaller trees. The Indians pulled the bark from these, and laid them in rows from the ridgepole to the outer wall. Across these Massea and Docas wove a network of twigs just as they did when they made the storehouse. They tied all these trees tightly to the ridgepole so that nothing could slip. ”

“ As soon as one horse began to run all the other horses began to run, too. The children clapped their hands, and the men yelled, so the horses kept on running round and round.
By the time Father Joseph told Massea to let them out, the ground was tramped as smooth and hard as cement.
Then Massea and Docas began hauling wheat from the fields in the big ox-carts, and piling it up in the middle of the circle on the hard ground. Heema had to go to school most of the time, but Alachu rode out with Docas in the empty cart, and came back on the top of the load. ”

“ He said something funny to Captain Vancouver. Oshda laughed, and the moment Father Pena saw Oshda open his mouth to laugh, he threw the cake into Oshda’s mouth. Oshda had to stop laughing, for his mouth was full of hot pancake.
He ate it as fast as he could, and then he was ready for another one. Father Pena kept throwing the cakes to the different boys, until no more cakes were left.
Docas went to the Father’s house just before breakfast. He said to Captain Vancouver, “Some of the soldiers are going to catch and kill some [91] cattle for the feast. Would you not like to go out and watch?” ”

“ They found that all the Indians were going into the big brush house, and they followed. As the people went in they knelt down. Massea said, “I am going to do as other people do,” so he knelt down, too. Then he took Ama and the children and went to a corner of the house to see what was going to happen.
Up in the front of the house some of the long white sticks were burning that the Indian from Monterey had told about. In a few minutes more Docas heard the sweetest sound! Heema began to talk to him just then, but Docas said, “Stop! I want to listen.” ”

“ When they were putting up the timbers, Docas saw that Father Joseph had had some of the Indians make a large notch in the upper end of each. He wanted to ask what the notch was for, but he had asked so many questions since he came to live at the Mission that he thought he would wait and see.
[83] As soon as the two posts were up, Father Joseph had the Indians lay a long tree from one to the other in order to make the ridgepole. The ridgepole lay snugly in the notch on top, so that it could not roll off. But even with the notch, Father Joseph said the ridgepole would not be steady enough. ”

“ On the next day Father Joseph and a number of the other men came out to the adobe bank.
“Dig up a patch of adobe,” said Father Joseph to Massea.
The children all stood around and watched while Massea dug.
“Now pour some water on the adobe and mix it up,” said Father Joseph.
In a few minutes Massea said, “It doesn’t mix easily. The adobe is in such large lumps.”
“Jump in, children, and dance around in the adobe. That will break up the lumps and make the adobe into a smooth paste,” said Father Joseph.
Docas, Yisoo, and a number of the other boys jumped in. ”

“ Just then the cart stopped, and they all got out at their new home.
“Aren’t you glad the house is not built yet?” Shecol asked Yappa. “We shall have to camp out all the summer and we can play we are wild Indians again.”
So the children trapped fish and gathered acorns for bread just as their grandfather told them he used to do. Docas was too old to work much, but their father and older brother, Occano, helped Don Secundini build the big adobe house near which Docas was to spend the rest of his life. ”

“ After the house was finished and the baskets were put away in it, they all went to help their friends build their houses. One of the Indians who was already living at the Mission brought them a bundle of straw, which Massea put across [59] the hole in front of their house. That meant to any Indian who might come to see them, “We are away from home, and shall be gone some time.”
BREAKFAST AT THE MISSION NEXT morning Ama got up very early. She went down to the creek bed and hunted about until she found two stones that she liked. One was large and flat on top ”

“ He then said to Massea and Docas, “We call the white men ‘father.’ They are very good to us. They showed us how to make a very large house. It is not made of brush, but is made of clay, and we call this house the church.” ”

“ So Don Secundini rode away a little distance, and then came galloping back. Suddenly he bent down, and in a moment more was holding the kicking, flopping rooster up in the air.
“Bueno, bueno!” they all cried.
“Let’s have the game of rods,” said the Señor Martinez. All the men and boys were on horseback, [140] so they made a ring with the horses facing inward. Señor Soto rode around the outside of the ring with a thick stick in his hand. Soon he passed the stick to Pedro and then rode quickly away. ”

“ What do you want of him?” answered Ama.
“We are going up into the mountains to get a big tree. Father Joseph wants him to come and help drag it down.” Before Ama could answer him he was off to find Docas.
Soon Father Joseph, Docas, Heema, and a great many other Indian men and boys started off for the mountains where the redwood trees grow. They took several oxen and several chains with them. The day before, Massea and two other men had gone up to the hills to fell the trees. ”

“ I hate to put these new pictures in the old brush house.”
“We are going to build one very soon. Father Pena told me so just before we started,” said Massea.
The day after Massea and Docas came home from San Francisco, Father Pena came to Docas and said, “Docas, where is the best clay bank?”
Docas thought a moment. Then he answered, “At the back of Yisoo’s house. Every time we try to walk across it after a rain we get stuck.”
[75] “Let’s go and take a look at it,” said Father Pena.
When they got there, they found Heema and Alachu making little clay mortars and pestles out of the adobe mud. ”

“ They did that with all the branches until they had a circle, putting the branches so close together that Docas could hardly look between them.
When the circle was finished, they bent all the tops of the branches together and tied them; then they covered the house with dry grass.
The Father tried to get Massea to build a better kind of house; he said he would show him how to do it, for the brush house was too cold. But Massea said, “No; we like this kind of house. When it gets too dirty, we will burn it down and build another.”
They left a little hole for a door. ”

“ I think you will say Indians, because all the children of whom I have ever asked this question have said that they liked best to read about Indians. Indians do everything so differently from the way we do that they are always interesting. ”

“ Yes, children can have such fun, running and playing and finding out about all kinds of things for which grown people never have time, that it is much pleasanter to read about them. So [vi] this whole book is about children. The first part tells about the little Indian boy, Docas; farther on, when Docas grows to be a man, the book tells about his children and grandchildren. ”

“ Soon a number of men came riding out toward the corrals. The servants rode off to help drive the cattle, while Don Secundini, Don Francisco, Señor Soto, Señor Sanchez, and Señor Martinez halted their horses just under the tree where Shecol and Yappa were sitting. ”