WEDNESDAY, FEB. 23. One of my Indian prisoners, sentenced to the works for theft, managed this morning to effect his escape, but was overtaken by the constable on the Salinas, and brought back. When asked by me what he ran for, he said the devil put it into his head. I asked him if he thought a ball and chain would keep the evil one off; he said it might, but then if he once got at him, he should stand no chance with one of his legs chained. I told him I should let his leg go for the present, but if he attempted to run again, I should chain both of them. “And my hands too,” said the Indian, to assure me of his good conduct. FRIDAY, MARCH 3. There is an old Mexican law, or usage, here, which has sometimes exempted from death the murderer who has reached the sanctuary of the church, or been favored with some accident, in the execution of the extreme sentence. Two desperadoes, of Mexican and Indian blood, were brought before me, charged with a wilful, deliberate murder. A jury of twelve citizens, the largest scope of challenge having been allowed, was empannelled. The prisoners were convicted and sentenced to be hung. But by some strange accident, or design, both knots slipped, and down they came, half imagining themselves still swinging in the air. The priest who confessed them, and who was present among the great crowd, immediately declared the penalty paid and the criminals absolved, and started post-haste to Gen. Mason for his mandate to that effect. The general told him the prisoners were sentenced to be hung by the neck till dead, and when this sentence had been executed, the knot-slipping business might perhaps be considered. This may seem to have been dictated by a want of humanity, but had the accident or stratagem in question rescued the criminals, not a noose in California would have held. The murderers were executed, and the crime for which they suffered vanished from the future records of the court. WEDNESDAY, MARCH 15. A lad of fourteen years was brought before me to-day charged with stealing a horse. The evidence of the larceny was conclusive; but what punishment to inflict was the question. We have no house of correction, and to sentence him to the ball and chain on the public works, among hardened culprits, was to cut off all hope of amendment, and inflict an indelible stigma on the youth; so I sent for his father, who had no good reputation himself, and placing a riata in his hand, directed him to inflict twenty-four lashes on his thieving boy. He proceeded as far as twelve, when I stopped him; they were enough. They seemed inflicted by one attempting to atone in this form for his own transgressions. “Inflict the rest, Soto, on your own evil example; if you had been upright yourself, you might expect truth and honesty in your boy; you are more responsible than this lad for his crimes; you can never chastise him into the right path, and continue yourself to travel in the wrong.” With these remarks I dismissed the parties.