Captain Moranda was early at the plaza. Many a señorita turned her glance from adventurous youth and cavorting horse to the soldier in trig uniform, whose steed was frequently by the side of Doña Carmelita's carreta. Preparations were now under way for the setting-out. Each carreta now had four horses, tandem, a postilion mounting the wheel animal of each team. "Sunlight on the peak!" intoned a peon stationed on a rooftop. Señor Mendoza, in charge of the affair, looked carefully over the carretas arranged longitudinally, the caballeros around them, and the fighting peons armed with carbine and saber. "Adelante!" he shouted and galloped away at the head of the cavalcade. The carretas surged forward. At the end of an hour, half way up the mountain, Mendoza gave a command to halt. The eastern sky was rosy. The morning star still shone undimmed though all others had retired. The cañon facing the procession was hidden in purple twilight, while the mountain peak blazed like some glory throne. The joyful men and women became silent before the majesty. In the valley the light was chasing the shadows up the hills. These shadows were flying to the picnickers as if for protection, when, lo! the sun was on the eastern horizon. Mendoza signaled Captain Morando, who chanted the opening line of Saint Francis of Assisi's "Canticle to the Sun." Tongue after tongue caught up the words. The Indians, who had been taught singing and knew well the music of the church, united with the others, and the swell of five hundred voices rolled over valley and hill. "O, most high, Almighty, good Lord, to thee belong the praise, honor, and all blessings: "Praised be our Lord, for our brother the wind, and for air and cloud, calms and all weather, by the which thou upholdest in life all creatures. "Praised be my Lord for our sister water, who is very serviceable unto us, and humble, and precious, and clean. "Praised be my Lord for our brother fire, through whom thou givest us light in the darkness; and he is bright, and pleasant, and very mighty and strong. "Praised be my Lord for our mother the earth, the which doth sustain us and keep us, and bringeth forth divers fruits and flowers of many colors, and grass." "Adelante!" again called Mendoza, and once more they were off. The odor of pine reached them at one height; at another the resinous redwood, in mammoth groves, pointed skyward. The señoritas and caballeros talked, laughed, sang, and perhaps mildly flirted. At ten o'clock they reached the entrance to the cañon which marked the beginning of Calaveras Valley. Vast tangles of blackberry bushes were everywhere, creeping up the cañon side, festooning projecting rocks, climbing trees, ivylike, and dropping their branches dark with ripening fruit. Tinkling rills ran along, unaffected by the drought. Colonies of birds floated in the air, sang in the trees, or, fluttering around the vines, ate their fill.