the affairs of the country that, when his successor arrived, all things were so disposed that a civil form of government was an easy matter of adjustment.  Colonel Mason was relieved by General Riley some time in April, and left California in the steamer of the 1st May for Washington and St. Louis, where he died of cholera in the summer of 1850, and his body is buried in Bellefontaine Cemetery.  His widow afterward married Major (since General) Don Carlos Buell, and is now living in Kentucky.

In overhauling the hold of the steamer California, as she lay at anchor in Monterey Bay, a considerable amount of coal was found under some heavy duplicate machinery.  With this, and such wood as had been gathered, she was able to renew her voyage.  The usual signal was made, and we all went on board.  About the 1st of March we entered the Heads, and anchored off San Francisco, near the United States line-of-battle-ship Ohio, Commodore T. Catesby Jones.  As was the universal custom of the day, the crew of the California deserted her; and she lay for months unable to make a trip back to Panama, as was expected of her.  As soon as we reached San Francisco, the first thing was to secure an office and a house to live in.  The weather was rainy and stormy, and snow even lay on the hills back of the Mission.  Captain Folsom, the quartermaster, agreed to surrender for our office the old adobe custom house, on the upper corner of the plaza, as soon as he could remove his papers and effects down to one of his warehouses on the beach; and he also rented for us as quarters the old Hudson Bay Company house on Montgomery Street, which had been used by Howard & Mellua as a store, and at that very time they were moving their goods into a larger brick building just completed for them.  As these changes would take some time, General Smith and Colonel Ogden, with their wives, accepted the hospitality offered by Commodore Jones on board the Ohio.  I opened the office at the custom house, and Gibbs, Fitzgerald, and some others of us, slept in the loft of the Hudson Bay Company house until the lower part was cleared of Howard’s store, after which General Smith and the ladies moved in.  There we had a general mess, and the efforts at house-keeping were simply ludicrous.  One servant after another, whom General Smith had brought from New Orleans, with a solemn promise to stand by him for one whole year, deserted without a word of notice or explanation, and in a few days none remained but little Isaac.  The ladies had no maid or attendants; and the general, commanding all the mighty forces of the United States on the Pacific coast, had to scratch to get one good meal a day for his family!  He was a gentleman of fine social qualities, genial and gentle, and joked at every thing.  Poor Mrs. Smith and Mrs. Ogden did not bear it so philosophically.  Gibbs, Fitzgerald, and I, could cruise around and find a meal, which cost three dollars, at some of the many restaurants