Excerpt from Annual Publications, Historical Society of Southern California, 1918-1920, Vol. 11

Frenchmen on this Spanish system, I Should have desired that to the principles of Christianity they had joined a legislation which, little by little, could have made citizens of the men whose state does not differ from that of the negroes of our most humanely governed colonies.23 Perhaps, they concluded, this system had been adopted for powerful' reasons Of state, with the Object of extending the Spanish interests further north.

These Frenchmen were much interested, also, in the natural resources of California, since the richness and fertility of the country were not generally known. The records of La Perouse furnished the first information France had, taken from actual Observation, of California, but he saw little of the country below Monterey, nor was he informed by the Spanish of their outposts in the South. The missionaries had taken but Slight advantage of the possibilities Of the fertile soils around Monterey, and outside Of growing some few grains and vegetables, they had made but few experiments along agricultural lines. La Perouse realized that many kinds of grains, vegetables, and fruit trees could easily be raised, and' he gave the padres new seeds for experimental use. California also is indebted to him for the introduction of the potato, which he brought with him from Chile.

The fur trade, too, was of interest to the Frenchmen. La Perouse estimated that twenty thousand skins a year were available for exportation from California to China, where the Chinese man darins furnished an almost unlimited demand for valuable Skins. Although the Spanish and Russian traders were already collecting pelts up and down the coast from Kamchatka to Monterey, yet La Perouse felt that there was also a wide field there for private French companies. He did not advise the French Government to establish a factory, however, since he considered that this trade would be more valuable in the hands of private French merchants.

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