of Híjar and Padrés. As soon as these bêtes noirs were fairly out of the country, therefore, he instructed Vallejo to establish at once garrison, town, and colony. His letters accompanying the instructions to Vallejo were dated June 24, 1835, and the site was to be in Sonoma Valley, instead of that formerly chosen at Santa Rosa. The chief motive announced was a desire to check the possible advance of Russian settlement from Bodega and Ross. Vallejo was authorized to issue grants of lands, which would be confirmed, and the only precaution urged was that the Mexican population should always be in excess of the foreign; that is, that the granting of lands should be made an obstacle rather than an aid to foreign encroachment. The young alférez was praised and flattered without stint, and urged to strive for "that reward to which all men aspire, posthumous fame," even if he should be called upon to make personally some advances of necessary supplies for the colony. The truth is, that Figueroa was not quite easy respecting the view that would be taken in Mexico of that part of his policy toward Híjar and Padrés which had caused the abandonment of the northern settlement; but with such a settlement actually established he would have no fears; hence his zeal.[1] The instructions that accompanied these letters are not extant, nor have we any official record respecting the founding of the town. We know only that at the ex-mission of San Francisco Solano, where he had spent much of the time for nearly a year as comisionado of secularization, Vallejo established himself with a small force in the summer of 1835, and laid out a pueblo to which was given the original name of the locality, Sonoma, Valley of the Moon, a name that for ten years and more had been familiar to the Californians. Vallejo
- ↑ June 24, 1835, confidential letters of Figueroa to Vallejo — or what purport to be and probably are copies of such letters — furnished by Vallejo to Gen. Kearny in 1847, in St. Pap., Miss. and Colon., MS., ii. 406-8; also printed with English translation in Californian, Apr. 13, 1847; Calif. Star, March 13, 1847; Jones' Report, no. 24.
