her Salvierderra had ever
officiated in the Moreno chapel, or heard the confession of a Moreno. He
was a Franciscan, one of the few now left in the country; so revered and
beloved by all who had come under his influence, that they would wait
long months without the offices of the Church, rather than confess
their sins or confide their perplexities to any one else. From this
deep-seated attachment on the part of the Indians and the older Mexican
families in the country to the Franciscan Order, there had grown up,
not unnaturally, some jealousy of them in the minds of the later-come
secular priests, and the position of the few monks left was not wholly a
pleasant one. It had even been rumored that they were to be forbidden
to continue longer their practice of going up and down the country,
ministering everywhere; were to be compelled to restrict their labors
to their own colleges at Santa Barbara and Santa Inez. When something
to this effect was one day said in the Senora Moreno's presence, two
scarlet spots sprang on her cheeks, and before she bethought herself,
she exclaimed, "That day, I burn down my chapel!"

Luckily, nobody but Felipe heard the rash threat, and his exclamation of
unbounded astonishment recalled the Senora to herself.

"I spoke rashly, my son," she said. "The Church is to be obeyed always;
but the Franciscan Fathers are responsible to no one but the Superior of
their own order; and there is no one in this land who has the authority
to forbid their journeying and ministering to whoever desires their
offices. As for these Catalan priests who are coming in here, I cannot
abide them. No Catalan but has bad blood in his veins!"

There was every reason in the world why the Senora should be thus warmly
attached to the Franciscan Order. From her earliest recollections the
gray gown and cowl had been familiar to her eyes, and had represented
the things which she was taught to hold most sacred and dear. Father
Salvierderra himself had come from Mexico to Monterey in the same ship
which had brought her father to be the commandante of the Santa Barbara
Presidio; and her best-beloved uncle, her father's eldest brother, was
at that time the Superior of the Santa Barbara Mission. The sentiment
and romance of her youth were almost equally divided between the
gayeties, excitements, adornments of the life at the Presidio, and the
ceremonies and devotions of the life at the Mission. She was famed as
the most beautiful