The present
number is not much, if any, short of one million.
Presuming a statistical knowledge of this country, before and after the
missionary institutions were secularized, may be interesting, I will
insert the following returns of 1831 and 1842, to contrast the same
with its present condition:--
1st. In 1832 the white population throughout Alta-California did not
exceed 4,500, while the Indians of the twenty-one missions amounted to
19,000; in 1842, the former had increased to 7,000, and the latter
decreased to about 5,000.
2nd. In the former year, the number of horned cattle, including
individual possessions, amounted to 500,000; in the latter, to 40,000.
3rd. At the same period, the number of sheep, goats, and pigs, was
321,000; at the latter, 32,000.
4th. In 1831 the number of horses, asses, mules, etc., was 64,000; in
1842 it was 30,000.
5th. The produce in corn, etc., had decreased in a much greater
proportion--that of seventy to four.
The amount of duties raised at the customhouse in Monterey, from 1839
to 1842, was as follows, viz.:--
1839 85,613 dollars.
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