At the time the news of their departure from Sonora reached California, Mr. Emory proposed to Mr. Walker, to revive the Auburn enterprise; and Walker, together with his former partner, Mr. Henry P. Watkins, sailed for Guaymas, in the month of June, 1853, intending to visit the Governor of Sonora, and try to get such a grant as might benefit the frontier towns and villages. Walker was careful to provide himself with a passport from the Mexican consul at San Francisco; but this availed him little when he reached Guaymas. The day after his arrival there the Prefect ordered him to the office of police, and after a long examination forbade him to leave for the interior, refusing to countersign his passport for Ures. Seeing the obstacles placed in his way at the outset, Walker determined to return to California; and after he went aboard the vessel for that purpose the Prefect sent him word the Governor, Gandara, had ordered his passport to be countersigned in order that he might go to the capital. The same courier who bore the order from Gandara to the Prefect, Navarro, also brought news that the Apaches had visited a country-house, a few leagues from Guaymas, murdering all the men and children, and carrying the women into a captivity worse than death. The Indians sent word that they would soon visit the town “where water is carried on asses’ backs”—meaning Guaymas; and the people of that port, frightened by the message, seemed ready to receive any one who would give them safety from their savage foe. In fact several of the women of the place urged Walker to repair immediately to California, and bring down enough Americans to keep off the Apaches.