and Portilla, was very quiet and careful in his movements; but Captain Nicanor Estrada, who had been exiled with Gutierrez but had also returned from Cape San Lúcas, was more active in enlisting men, preparing arms, and arousing enthusiasm for the cause, being assisted by a party of refugees from the north, who had fled from Los Angeles at Alvarado's approach in January. Not much is known in detail of the preparations; but fifty or seventy-five men were enlisted, including, I suppose, remnants of the old compañía de fronteras, and were armed as well as circumstances would permit. Indian hostilities, to be mentioned later, interfered somewhat with the progress of these patriotic efforts.[1] Osio and Pico were secret supporters of this movement, and their plan already noticed was doubtless a part of it, those gentlemen having changed their mind about the policy of being "devoured by wild beasts" rather than obey a Mexican mandarin. Strangely, in their narratives they say little or nothing of events in these months, though the former has described so minutely the preceding occurrences.
It will be remembered that late in April, San Diego had approved the new system as expressed in the Santa Bárbara plan of April 11th, though postponing on a frivolous pretext the formal swearing of allegiance. If the ayuntamiento took any action later on receipt of Alvarado's explanation, it is not recorded. On
- ↑ These preparations are briefly related, and subsequent events more fully, in Bandini, Hist. Cal., MS., 86-97. The author regards the treaty of Jan. 26th at Los Angeles as merely a trick of Alvarado to disarm the south, and the action of the dip. at Sta Bárbara on April 11th as a flagrant violation of that treaty. The subsequent 'persecution' of S. Diego by Alvarado in sending Castro to take away the cannon, and in arresting members of the ayunt., rendered the Dieguinos desperate. They went to the frontier, and in a few days raised 70 men, but had to suspend operations for a time to fight Indians. The same version in much more grandiloquent language is given in Bandini, Sucesos del Sur, Mayo y Agosto, 1837, MS., a report to the minister of hacienda, dated Aug. 4th, in which, of course after a new tirade against Angel Ramirez, Don Juan tells how 'S. Diego never faltered in her heroic devotion to Mexico,' and how, 'resolved to sacrifice our existence in favor of the national government, we planned for victory or an honorable death.' He does not name Zamorano. Janssens, Vida, MS., 90-121, was one of the refugees from Angeles, and, if we may credit his story, which there is no one to contradict, took a very prominent part in all this campaign.
