CALIFORNIA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 219 



present year must have been one of unusual drought; for 

 the entire plateau of the southern half of the island was a 

 sunburnt waste, with hardly a leaf of living verdure; and 

 yet the sere stems of the preceding year's growth were knee 

 high everywhere, showing that the rains on Guadalupe in 

 1884 must have been as unusually copious as they were in 

 the southern parts of California for that year. The north- 

 ern half of the island is less dependent upon actual rainfall, 

 so constant and so heavy are the fogs that envelop all its 

 higher and more fertile altitudes. The vicinity of the 

 springs, the district of highest fertility, would naturally, in 

 the absence of all human occupants, become the favorite 

 pasture ground for the destructive flocks of goats. The 

 presence of the small garrison must already have had a fa- 

 vorable effect upon the vegetation of this very best part of 

 the island. A detail of soldiers is sent here daily with don- 

 keys and water-casks, after the supply of water for their 

 encampment on the beach five or six miles below; and as 

 often as twice a week a certain number encamp here under 

 the cypress trees to hunt goats on the ridges and mesas 

 above. Consequently the timid flocks never come near these 

 freshest of all pastures, and a rank vegetation is the result. 

 Twelve of the fifteen species which I have added to the 

 former list of Guadalupe plants were found in this partiular 

 district. 



These general observations may be concluded with two 

 or three remarks upon the fauna of the island. Of indige- 

 nous quadrupeds I saw nothing larger than mice; but these 

 were very abundant, yet hardly more plentiful than a cer- 

 tain natural enemy of theirs which has become naturalized, 

 namely, the domestic cat. From almost any little clump of 

 bushes, or from behind any rock, the herbalist may startle 

 into most swift, precipitous flight a large, sleek, handsome, 

 well fed feline. The rocky places abound not only in mice, 

 but in a species of wren, that is tame and confiding beyond 

 the habit of any wild bird one meets with elsewhere; and on 



