The voyage of
Francis Drake, 1577-1580, was a private venture, but at Drake's Bay he
proclaimed the sovereignty of Elizabeth, and named the country New
Albion. Two hundred years later (1792-1793) Captain George Vancouver
explored the coast of California down to thirty degrees of north
latitude (Ensenada de Todos Santos), which, he says, "is the
southernmost limit of New Albion, as discovered by Sir Francis Drake, or
New California, as the Spaniards frequently call it." Even after the
occupation and settlement by the Spaniards, so feeble were their
establishments that, as Vancouver reports to the Admiralty, it would
take but a small force to wrest from Spain this most valuable
possession. But though the growing feebleness of Spain presaged the time
when her hold upon America would be loosened, the standard of individual
heroism was not lowered, and the achievements of Portola and of Anza
rank with those of De Soto and Coronado. The California explorer did
not, it is true, have to fight his way through hordes of fierce natives.
The California Indians, as a rule, received the white adventurers
gladly, and entertained them with such hospitality as they had to offer,
but the Indians north of the Santa Barbara Channel were but a poor lot.
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