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Show 118 PERSONAL ADVENTURES boxes and knapsacks to serve us in lieu of beds. I was fortunate enough to fall asleep, and to sleep soundly, in spite of the ribald merriment that made the walls of the church rinO' 0 with peals of blasphemous laughter. I awoke much refreshed, and was able to attend muster in good time. Not so my companions, who presently came straggling into the ranks by twos and threes, some rubbing their eyes, some gaping and stretching, others again less than half-dressed, and more still in their fatigue dress, but all equally careless of discipline, chatting and laughing as they stood in the ranks, and in the san1e breath cursing the drumtner and his drum, and the military ser- • VICe. I have already shown, by narrating instances of open insubordination, that such irregularities as these were amongst the least serious evils of the American volunteer system, and I soon learned that they were developed on a far more extensive scale in Mexico than in California. Many of the companies held the authority of IN CALIFORNIA. 119 their superiors and the regulations of the military service in utter contempt, alleging that the officers were men whon1 they had selected to command them in the field only, and who had no right to govern their actions, save in the hour of danger; whilst, as regarded the rules of military service, the volunteers were, by their very condition, not bound to conform to them. The disorganization and confusion resulting from such a state of things may be easily conceived; but it is doing the men the barest justice to a,.dd, that, when the hour came for action, they sho,ved then1selves worthy of their country, and, by their deeds of gallantry on numerous occasions, emulated, if they did not frequently outvie, the prowess of the regulars . I found the inhabitants of La Paz more intelligent than the people of Monterey, whilst the habits of the lower classes were even more simple and primitive. The chief articles of food amongst the latter are beef, tortillas, and penocke. These tortillas are a kind of cake made of ground Indian corn, and the penoche |