Nov 16– From "Two Years Before the Mast" by Richard Henry Dana Jr. (1840)

 Sherwood Forest, California, same difference.

Nov 16– From Two Years Before the Mast by Richard Henry Dana Jr. (1840)

Summary: California is a savage country, but great farmland and harbors.

Commentary: This reading starts with explaining the "discovery" of California. I think that makes it sound like it was hiding. You just keep going west and get there! (Apparently it was discovered by sea. That makes sense, no one was exploring across that far west for a couple hundred years as far as I can tell.) California seems pretty terrible. And very conservative compared to today. Plenty of semi-random killing, only sort of a functional government:

In their domestic relations, these people are no better than in their public. The men are thriftless, proud, and extravagant, and very much given to gaming; and the women have but little education, and a good deal of beauty, and their morality, of course, is none of the best; yet the instances of infidelity are much less frequent than one would at first suppose. In fact, one vice is set over against another; and thus, something like a balance is obtained. The women have but little virtue, but then the jealousy of their husbands is extreme, and their revenge deadly and almost certain

Very Heinlein.

And of course, the Indians are abused, as was common at the time.