clung to the Fathers like little children to their parents, and from the
vices of paganism, under a healthy and kind rule drawn for them by the
wise Fathers, christian virtues took a deep root in at least a great
many of these poor "children of the soil" and so great was the care
exercised by the Fathers that nightly they would make a round of the
rooms allotted to every christian and neophyte Indian family to see that
order and decency reigned in each group; for we must remember these
souls were but recently rescued from the dark sins of heathenism.

Blessed temples! noble hospices! heroic priests! We are loathe to change
the scene, but winter's storms must come ere the laurel wreath crowns
the glorified brow! Still, we need not leave the "enchanted palace" yet,
vernal loveliness still charms the eyes and summer is just begun.

If it be but for one brief moment let us ruminate the glories, the
wealth, the beauty of mission joys, before the least cruel echoes of
Secularization are heard. The sun of Franciscan and Spanish glory is
still mounting the firmament higher and higher. The sky still wears Our
Lady's blue[2] and no penitential purple has appeared with the departing
rays of sunset, only the royal purple and gold which years before had
made the scene a fairylike setting for the heavenset relief ship to San
Diego and assured the noble enterprise of the exploration and
christianizing of California.



[1] Official title of the Kings of Spain.

[2] Blue and white are the symbolical colors of the Blessed Virgin Mary.