Small wonder, though the reading of this Bulletin to the Battalion was unaccountably delayed for four days, that the Mormon volunteers received this official announcement of their achievements with hearty cheers. FOOTNOTES: [46:a] Tyler, pp. 244-5. [46:b] Cooke's Conquest, p. 185. [46:c] Ibid, p. 184. [47:d] "Conquest," p. 187. [49:e] Conquest, p. 193. [51:f] Conquest, p. 195--note. [53:g] Cooke's Conquest, p. 197. Subsequently, viz., on the 9th of May, on the occasion of General Kearny visiting the Battalion at Los Angeles, he is reported to have said that history would be searched in vain for an infantry march equal to the Battalion's, and added: "Bonaparte crossed the Alps, but these men have crossed a continent." Tyler's Battalion, p. 282. VII. THE BATTALION IN CALIFORNIA. Subsequent movements of the Battalion were as follows: =At San Luis Rey Mission.=--On the evening of their second day at San Diego Mission, an order was issued for the Battalion to return to San Luis Rey Mission, to garrison that station. This Mission was somewhat midway between Los Angeles and San Diego, and it was doubtless thought that the Battalion by being stationed there could keep that important position out of the enemies' hands, should Mexican hostilities again be resumed, as at the time seemed probable; and they would also be available there for quicker movement either to Los Angeles or to San Diego should danger threaten at either point. Accordingly on February 1st, the return march was begun and ended about noon of the 3rd. =Clean Up and Drill.=--Here orders were given for a general clean up of arms and clothes--such as they had--shaving, cutting hair, and the like. "Some had not shaved since the march began, and would have preferred not to do so until they returned to their people," says the Battalion's historian. But the order was imperative. "It prescribed that no beard be allowed to grow below the tip of the ear, hence the mustache only could be saved. The hair also must be clipped even with the tip of the ear," hence the long and tangled locks and shocks of hair of a year's growth had to be sacrificed. By the 6th of February the men had finished cleaning up and repairing their quarters, which in some respects even then "were not the most pleasant," writes Tyler, "as we were over-run with fleas, as well as the more filthy vermin, and no person, however cleanly he aimed to be, could escape from them." On the 8th of February, according to Tyler, "Colonel Cooke and Lieutenant Stoneman commenced the squad drill with officers which, continued and extended to companies and thence to the Battalion, and lasted altogether for twenty days, when the Battalion was supposed to have learned the drill, and all the officers were considered capable of teaching it."