THE CERIS INDIANS.—REPORTED CAPTIVITY OF A SPANISH LADY.

Colonist, Volume III, Issue 226, 20 December 1859, Page 4

THE CERIS INDIANS.—REPORTED CAPTIVITY OF A SPANISH LADY.

At the present time, when a case of assumed captivity of white girls amongst the aborigines is under investigation, the' following in reference to the Ceris Indians will be interesting. It occurs in the correspondence of the San Francisco Evening Bulletin of September 26. . The writer, dates from Senora:— ■ These Ceris are now quiet and peaceful, and the highway as secure as'any in 1 California. Every mile or two1 we passed a long stajo of mules or a string of heavy waggons bound down to Guaymas, But it was not always so. Five years ago' Senorita —was one of the belles of Guaymas. Young, beautiful, and witty, of good decent' and well connected, life passed merrily along, and all her dreams of futurity were doubtless clothed in the roseate -hues' that gild the visions of youth. In an evil hour she left her home to pay a long-due visit to Borne friends in Hermossillo. On the'road the escort was attacked and overpowered by a prowling band of Ceris, the men slain, and herself and a little boy carried into captivity. Long and unwearied was the j search instituted by the bereaved family i for their missing child; but all ill vain. The haunts of the Ceris were ransacked without the slightest clue being discovered, and her relations were reluctantly forced to admit the conclusion that she had only tieeri spared in the general massacre to be put to death with all the refinement of cruelty that only a savage mind could elaborate. Years passed on, the circumstance was almost forgotten in the whirl of political excitement. When the family reflected on the lost one, it was as if the tomb had closed over her. Masses were said for the repose of her spirit, and Time, the healer, had cicatrized the wound her loss had caused in the bosoms of those to whom she had been rear and dear. The Ceris became reduced in numbers, and were compelled to obedience; their stronghold, Tiburdn, was thrown open to the curiosity of the traveller, and the mys^ tery which once enveloped its fastnesses rudely dispelled. A month ago a wandering fisherman, passing through one. of the Ceri villages, was accosted by a young female, retaining yet in her squalor the traces of superior beauty, the wife of the principal chief, who, addressing him in imperfect Spanish, inquired if he knew the family of -, in Guaymas. He replied in affirmative, and, his curiosity excited by the questions she proposed concerning its members, he pressed inquiries in his turn, when she confessed she was the longmourned senorita. Her captors had concealed her deftly while the search was going on, then tattooed her person, and the chief had chosen her for his consort. Two children were the fruit of this union, and, to the urging of the man that she: would-at-, tempt to escape, under, his guidance, she replied that she had become reconciled to her fate, and had no desire to return to the place of her nativity to be an object for the pity or perhaps the jeers and scoffs of her former companions and rivals. Besides, any attempt of flight would, if unsuccessful, entail certain destruction on both. The boy was completly Indianized, and expressed himself perfectly delighted with, his present life, and without the slightest desire to change it. The poor girl parted in tears from her compassionate, countryman, who returned to Guaymas: with the. news. Immediately on receipt of the: information, the brothers of the young lady, well armed and provided, set out for the Geri country, resolved to rescue their sister at all hazards. When I left Guaymas, they had not yet returned, nor had any advices been received as to how they had sped in their mission.