WASHINGTON TO SAN FRANCISCO 157 



the few business streets) stands in from half an acre to one 

 acre and a half of garden. Some are pretty stone built villas, 

 some mere rude hovels, but all have the spacious garden. 

 And they are real gardens, the first I have seen in America, 

 full of flowers and fruit trees, and with abundant creepers 

 over the houses. 



The streets are about one hundred and thirty feet wide, 

 with shady trees, and a channel of clear water on both sides 

 of each street brought from the mountain. Every garden is 

 thus supplied with abundance of water for irrigation, when 

 required, by small channels under the side walks, and sluice 

 gates to regulate the supply. Crops can thus be grown dur- 

 ing a large part of the year. I walked a few miles into the 

 country, and seeing a small house and pretty flower garden 

 with some of our commonest garden flowers, roses, stocks, 

 marigolds, etc., I spoke to a homely looking woman and 

 found she was Welsh. A good many Welsh have become 

 Mormons. 



In the afternoon I returned to Ogden, and went on by 

 train in the evening. All the next day (Sunday, May 22) 

 we passed through an arid dreary country, the ground cov- 

 ered with saline incrustations and almost the only vegetation 

 the sage bush (Artemisia spinescens). At the stations in 

 more fertile spots there was a little verdure and sometimes 

 a few wild flowers — Oenotheras or composites. At all the 

 stations there were groups of Indians, usually with painted 

 faces but with European dress, one old man only with the 

 native blanket, boys shooting with bows and arrows, groups 

 of men and women playing cards. The passengers give them 

 money or buy ornaments, etc., and thus they live idly, get fat, 

 and are thoroughly demoralized. At Reno, where we supped, 

 the country began to get less arid, and there were some good 

 farms in the valleys. We passed over the pass of the Sierra 

 Nevada at night, and before sunrise were in the foothills of 

 California, bare, except for a few second-growth pines ; then 

 farms, orchards, and vineyards, with eucalyptus trees planted 

 round the houses ; then a low, flat country to Oakland, where 

 huge ferry boats cross the bay to San Francisco. 



