Font was Anza's chaplain, and with Garces's
aid later made a map of the country.* At Yuma Garces left the Anza
party, went down to the mouth of the Colorado, and then up along the
river to Mohave, and after another trip out to San Gabriel, he started
on the most important part of all his journeys, from Mohave to the Moki
Towns, the objective point of all entradas eastward from the Colorado.
The importance attached at that time to the towns of the Moki probably
seems absurd to the reader, but it must not be forgotten that the Moki
were cultivators of the soil and always held a store of food-stuffs in
reserve. They were also builders of very comfortable houses, as I can
testify from personal experience. Thus they assumed a prominence, amidst
the desolation of the early centuries, of which the railway in the
nineteenth speedily robbed them.

* Font says of Garces: "He seems just like an Indian himself...
and though the food of the Indians is as nasty and disgusting as their
dirty selves the padre eats it with great gusto." Dr. Coues had planned
to publish a translation of Font's important diary. See Garces, by
Elliot Coues, p. 172, Font meant his remark as praise.

Garces, like most of his kind, was an enthusiast on the subject of
saving the souls of the natives. "It made him sick at heart," says
Coues, "to see so many of them going to hell for lack of the three drops
of water he would sprinkle over them if only they would let him do it."
With this idea ever in mind he toiled up and down the lower Colorado,
and received assistance from a Yuma chief called Captain Palma. Once
when he came up the river to Yuma, where he had left Padre Eisarc, the
report the latter gave was so encouraging that Garces exclaims: "I gave
a thousand thanks to God to hear them sing psalms divine that the padre
had taught them." He further declared that Captain Palma would put to
the blush for observing the forms of piety, "many veteran Christians,
by the reverence and humility with which he assisted at the holy
sacrifice." But alas for the padre's fond hopes!

The Yumas called the Colorado Javill or Hahweel according to Garces; and
he also says the name Colorado was given because, as the whole country
is coloured, its waters are tinged in the month of April, when the snows
are melting, but that they are not always red, which is exactly the
case. The name is also said to be a translation of the Piman title
"buqui aquimuti."

Leaving Moh