262 CHANNEL ISLANDS OF CALIFORNIA 



dashed into a long, rolling valley, where the air was 

 like velvet on the cheek and an incense of flowers and 

 vines filled the nostrils. At one moment Nature at 

 her wildest, with stupendous chasms and precipices; 

 the next, masses of verdure, rows of vines laden with 

 grapes, acres of green gardens, plume-like eucalyptus 

 trees, besides walnut, fig, and others — a gem in the 

 very heart of the island, surrounded by high moun- 

 tains, invisible and unsuspected from the not far 

 distant sea. 



The Caire ranch has been in existence for nearly 

 thirty years; but probably it has not been heard of 

 in the East, and is known by few people on the Pacific 

 Coast. Yet here on an island, twenty miles out in 

 the Pacific, up a canon almost impassable at times in 

 winter, is a model ranch, presided over by its super- 

 intendent and attended to by sixty or more men. The 

 proprietor is French, and French and Italian laborers 

 are employed exclusively, the original plan having 

 been to establish here a Swiss-French colony. The 

 little valley in the interior and its climate, so similar 

 to that of Italy and Southern France, probably inspired 

 the owner to reproduce a European vineyard here, and 

 so faithfully has the idea been carried out that on 

 entering the valley one can easily imagine himself in 

 one of the wine-producing districts of France or Italy. 

 Not far from the ranch houses is a large vegetable 

 garden for the benefit of the men, making a most 

 luxuriant showing, and telling the story of the rich- 

 ness of the soil that produces vegetables every month 

 in the year. The two ranch houses of brick covered 

 with plaster and whitewashed, with a small veranda 

 and iron balconies wherever there was an excuse to 



