194 WITH THE FLOWERS AND TREES 



postcards, is the fruit garden given over to orange 

 trees, pomegranates, trellised grapes and doubtless 

 the quinces well beloved of all Spanish-Californians. 

 Behind the house, or rather enclosed within it, is 

 the flower garden a rectangular patio one side of 

 which is hedged by a dense wall of Monterey cypress ; 

 and the other three fenced in by the house and wings, 

 with broad sheltered verandas facing the flowery 

 enclosure. The noisy world shut out, the blue sky 

 overhead, the air sweet with roses and slumberous 

 with hum of bees, it is a place for dreams and con- 

 templation. In the center is a circular fountain 

 surrounded by a closely trimmed hedge of Monterey 

 cypress, whose well known submissiveness to topi- 

 ary treatment has been availed of by the gardener, 

 and the rim is clipped into a series of big buttons. 

 At the time of my last visit, the flower beds, though 

 more orderly than Dona Margarita's, were charac- 

 terized by the same conservative devotion to the 

 favorites of the early days, and an arbor by the 

 kitchen was overrun with an enormous snail vine, 

 its stem as thick as my wrist. The quaint creamy- 

 blue blossoms with their corkscrew twist suggesting 

 a snail-shell, perfumed all the air about the kitchen 

 door. This plant (Phaseolus Caracalla) was a com- 

 mon one in all old Spanish-California gardens, under 

 the name of caracal, as though it were given to 



