maining three millions were retained to pay
the "lobby" and confirm the treaty. The treaty was signed in Mexico on
the 23d day of December, 1853.

Pending the negotiation of the treaty between the high contracting
parties, in the City of Mexico, the discussion of the subject grew
interesting at the Government Boarding-House in San Francisco, and a new
California was hoped for on the southern boundary. Old Spanish history
was ransacked for information from the voyages of Cortez in the Gulf of
California to the latest dates, and maps of the country were in great
demand.

In the mean time an agent of the Iturbide family had arrived in San
Francisco with a "Mexican Grant." After the execution of the Emperor
Iturbide, the Congress of the Mexican Republic voted an indemnity to the
family of one million dollars; but on account of successive revolutions
this sum was never at the disposition of the Mexican treasury, and in
liquidation the Mexican government made the family a grant of land in
California, north of the Bay of San Francisco, but before the land could
be located, the Americans had "acquired" the country, and it was lost.
The heirs then made application to the Mexican government for another
grant of land in lieu of the California concession, and were granted
seven hundred leagues of land, to be located in Sonora, Sinaloa and
Lower California, in such parcels as they might select.

Seven hundred leagues, or 3,000,800 acres, is a large tract of land in a
single body, and the attorney of the heirs considered it more convenient
to locate the land in small tracts of a league or two at a place. The
government of Mexico conceded whatever was required, and the grant was
made in all due form of Mexican law.

In the discussion at the Government Boarding House in San Francisco it
was urged: That the Gulf of California was the Mediterranean of the
Pacific, and its waters full of pearls. That the Peninsula of Lower
California was copper-bound, interspersed with gold and minerals,
illustrated with old Spanish Missions, and fanned by the gentlest
breezes from the South Pacific. That the State of Sonora was one of the
richest of Mexico in silver, copper, gold, coal and other materials,
with highly productive agricultural valleys in the temperate zone. That
the country north of Sonora, called in the Spanish history "Arizunea"
(rocky country) was full of minerals, with fertile valleys washed by
numerous rivers, and covered by fores