nd roofed with tules. On October 3, the day
preceding the festival of St. Francis, bunting and flags from the ships
were brought to decorate the new buildings; but, owing to the absence of
Moraga, the formal dedication did not take place until October 9. Happy
was Serra's friend and brother, Palou, to celebrate high mass at this
dedication of the church named after the great founder of his Order, and
none the less so were his assistants, Fathers Cambon, Nocedal, and Pena.

Just before the founding of the Mission of San Francisco, the Spanish
Fathers witnessed an Indian battle. Natives advanced from the region of
San Mateo and vigorously attacked the San Francisco Indians, burning
their houses and compelling them to flee on their tule rafts to the
islands and the opposite shores of the bay. Months elapsed before these
defeated Indians returned, to afford the Fathers at San Francisco an
opportunity to work for the salvation of their souls.

In October of the following year, Serra paid his first visit to San
Francisco, and said mass on the titular saint's day. Then, standing near
the Golden Gate, he exclaimed: "Thanks be to God that now our father,
St. Francis, with the holy professional cross of Missions, has reached
the last limit of the Californian continent. To go farther he must
have boats."

The same month in which Palou dedicated the northern Mission, found
Serra, with Padre Gregorio Amurrio and ten soldiers, wending their way
from San Diego to San Juan Capistrano, the foundation of which had been
delayed the year previous by the San Diego massacre. They disinterred
the bells and other buried materials and without delay founded the
Mission. With his customary zeal, Serra caused the bells to be hung and
sounded, and said the dedicatory mass on November 1, 1776. The original
location of this Mission, named by the Indians _Sajirit_, was
approximately the site of the present church, whose pathetic ruins speak
eloquently of the frightful earthquake which later destroyed it.

Aroused by a letter from Viceroy Bucareli, Rivera hastened the
establishment of the eighth Mission. A place was found near the
Guadalupe River, where the Indians named _Tares_ had four _rancherias_,
and which they called _Thamien_. Here Padre Tomas de la Pena planted the
cross, erected an _enramada_, or brush shelter, and on January 12, 1777,
said mass, dedicating the new Mission to the Virgin, Santa Clara, one of
the early converts of Francis of