At Moore’s Flat I found my mine well and profitably worked by Mr. Tyler and as his lease was not out I returned to San Jose, as I had learned from Rogers that Mr. A. Bennett was at Watsonville, and Mr. Arcane at Santa Cruz, and I desired to visit them.  I rode back across the country and found Mr. Bennett and family at the point where the Salinas river enters Monterey Bay.  They were all well, and were glad to see me for they did not know I was in California.  Mrs. Bennett was greatly affected at our meeting and shed tears of joy as she shook hands.

Bennett had a nice Whitehall boat and we had a genuine happy time hunting, fishing and gathering clams, and also in social visits among the neighbors and old acquaintances, among them one Jacob Rhodehouse of Wisconsin.

While here I rode my horse around to Monterey and to Carmel Mission, where I staid two or three days, with Mr. Gourley, a brother of Mrs. William M. Stockton, who was here engaged in raising potatoes.  I walked along the beach near some rocky islands near the shore, and on these rocks were more sea lions and seals than I supposed the whole ocean contained—­the most wonderful show of sea life on the California coast.  Returning I staid all night at the crossing of the Salinas with a colored family who gave me good accommodations for self and horse.  I heard afterward that this family was attacked by robbers and all but one murdered.

Mrs. Bennett’s father D.J.  Dilley lived near here also, and I had not seen him since the time in Wisconsin, when he hauled my canoe over to the river in 1849.  One day while fishing on the beach we found the body of a man, which we carried above the tide and buried in the sand.

I gave one of my horses to Geo. Bennett, and went over to Santa Cruz, where I found Mr. and Mrs. J.B.  Arcane and son Charles in a comfortable home, well situated, and overjoyed to see me.

He knew everyone in town, and as we went about he never missed to introduce me to every one we met, as the man who helped himself and family out of Death Valley, and saved their lives.  Arcane was a very polite Frenchman and knew how to manage such things very gracefully, but with all his grace and heartiness it made me feel quite a little embarrassed to be made so much of publicly and among strangers.  He took me in his buggy and we drove along the beach, and to the lime-kiln of Cowel & Jordan, also to the court house when court was in session.

Upon the hill I met Judge Watson, the father of Watsonville, and a Mr. Graham, an old settler and land owner, and on this occasion he pulled a sheet of ancient, smoky looking paper from beneath his arm, pointed to a dozen or so of written lines in Spanish and then with a flourish of the precious document in Watson’s face dared him to beat that, or get him off his land.  I must say that never in my life was I better entertained than here.