After a time, it is said, they went down to southern California and settled on the border of the Colorado desert, about seventy-five miles east of San Diego, in a mountainous and desert region.  Here they found a small tribe of Indians, and by each marrying a squaw they secured rights equal to any of them in the occupation of the land.  This was considered pretty sharp practice, but it suited them and they became big chiefs and midecine men, and numerous dusky descendants grew up around them.

It is said that their property consists of extensive pasture lands on which they raise cattle, and that they always go well armed with pistol, rifle and riata.  It is said that some of the Indians undertook to claim that the Helms brothers were intruders, but that in some mysterious way accidents happened to most of them and they were left without any serious opposition.

They are very hospitable and entertaining to people who visit them, provided they do not know too much about the men or their former deeds or history.  In this case ignorance is bliss and it is folly, if not dangerous, to be too wise.  They have made no improvements, but live in about the same style as the Indians and about on a level with them morally and intellectually.

There may be those who know them well, but the writer only knows them by hearsay and introduces them as a certain type of character found in the early days.

As I was now about barefoot I went to town to look for boots or shoes.  There were no shoes, and a pair of the cheapest boots I found hanging at the door were priced to me at two ounces.  This seemed a wonderful sum for a pair of coarse cow-hide boots that would sell in the state for two dollars and fifty cents; but I had to buy them at the price or go barefoot.

While rambling around town I went into a round tent used as a gambling saloon.  The occupants were mostly men, and one or two nice appearing ladies, but perhaps of doubtful reputation.  The men were of all classes—­lawyer, doctors, preachers and such others as wanted to make money without work.  The miners, especially sailors, were eager to try to beat the games.  While I was here the table was only occupied by a sailor lying upon it and covered with a green blanket.  All at once the fellow noticed a large piojo walking slowly across the table, and drawing his sheath knife made a desperate stab at him, saying “You kind of a deck hand can’t play at this game.”

Our claims, by this time were nearly worked out, and I thought that I had upward of two thousand dollars in gold, and the pile looked pretty big to me.  It seemed to me that these mines were very shallow and would soon be worked out, at least in a year or two.  I could not see that the land would be good for much for farming when no irrigation could be easily got, and the Spanish people seemed to own all the best land as well as the water; so that a poor fellow like myself would never get rich at farming here.