226 
nailed to the posts so as to make rectangular 
lattice work with openings one foot square. 
A dark green stain was applied, and the 
cost of all materials amounted to about 
$35, or 15 cents per running foot of fence. 
Had I not contributed the labor myself, 
the cost would have been about $65. 
Owing to the irregular “lay of the land” 
and its sliding down to the back and to one 
side, we found it impracticable to lay out 
flower beds satisfactorily without radical 
regrading, and the dry season was well 
under way before we could devote attention 
to the matter. The ground at that season 
was baked quite hard and the July sun 
was very ardent, but it would probably 
have been four months before the winter 
rains would come to soften it, and such 
a delay would mean a whole season’s loss 
of perennial bloom. 
The plan followed was to fill the lower 
portions of the lot with the dirt dug from 
the higher parts, and arrange the garden 
in a series of level, descending low terraces 
or “benches.” 
The first terrace adjoined the house and 
was the whole width of the lot, sixty feet by 
twenty feet deep, with an L eight feet wide 
running at right angles along one of the 
side fences; the second terrace, dropped 
to a level two feet below, was fifty-two feet 
wide by twenty feet deep with a similar, but 
wider L paralleling the first and two feet 
lower; the third terrace, dropped to a 
level two feet below the second, measured 
thirty by forty-five feet and occupied about 
one quarter of the lot extending to the rear 
line. 
The ground worked hard, indeed, on the 
surface after nearly three months of dry 
weather, and had to be broken with a mat- 
tock; but at a depth of six or eight inches 
it was mellow enough to be readily spaded, 
and at a foot deep was perceptibly damp. 
A few spots which had been packed 
especially hard by being walked on, were 
softened by allowing the hose to trickle 
upon them for some hours. 
The next step was to make retaining 
walls to hold each terrace in place and also 
to hold in the earth about two of the orange 
trees that had been left high and dry by the 
cutting down of the higher ground. 
For this we got two loads of the round 
water-worn arroyo stones — or cobbles — 
Midsummer bloom in the garden. Gaillardia, Shasta 
daisy and sweet William 
THE GARDEN MAGAZINE 
Building the pergola, which was to act later as a 
summer house 
from the washes near the mountains, and 
hired a stone mason to build them into 
walls. On the lowest level, near the rear 
of the lot within a square determined by 
four of the orange trees, we erected a small 
pergola 12 x 6 ft. to serve us, when it should 
be vine-covered, as a summer house. The 
construction of this was of the simplest — 
four redwood 2x 4 in. posts set eight feet 
high above the ground, connected length- 
wise by two timbers of the same size, cross- 
wise, upon which we nailed on edge four 
redwood planks 2 x 6 in. at equal distances. 
Flat stones made a serviceable and artistic 
pavement. 
PLANTING THE GARDEN 
We desired to have the terrace nearest the 
house turfed, so as to provide an evergreen 
foreground to the flower garden. As this 
space would be walked on a great deal, we 
decided upon Lippia repens, which makes 
a close mat, can be mowed like grass, may 
be tramped over with impunity and thrives 
on a minimum of water. Moreover, it 
is a charming little plant when in blossom, 
a patch of it making a whole flower garden 
in itself, beloved of the bees and the wander- 
ing wind. 
We planted the cuttings in midsummer, 
kept them well soaked for a few days and 
protected with a layer of newspapers during 
the heat of the day, and by the beginning 
of the rainy season they were forming good 
sized mats. Our experience with lippia 
is that it requires more time than grass or 
clover to make a turf, but once established 
its drought-resisting properties render it 
valuable for many situations where a lawn 
would be troublesome and expensive to 
maintain. 
Terrace number two, the sunniest portion 
of the garden, was edged on two adjoining 
sides with a 2-foot retaining wall, with a 
special cozy-corner made by the angle of 
the wall, where we sunk a water-tight half 
barrel for a water lily; planted about the 
rim a few umbrella plants (Cyperus alterni- 
jolius); a German ivy (Senecio scandens) 
to clamber over the low wall; a few violets; 
a couple of forget-me-nots; a root of the 
small sneezewort (Helenium pumilum); and 
another of spearmint —the whole making 
a nook of watery coolness very refreshing 
in a dry land. Some plants of creeping fig 
DECEMBER, 1908 
(Ficus repens) were set against the retaining 
wall at different points to mitigate the rather 
pronounced white and black of the arroyo 
stones. 
This situation, however, owing to its 
being partially shaded by an orange tree, 
proved not sunny enough for the best develop- 
ment of water-lilies, and we are arranging 
to substitute for it a less particular aquatic 
— the water hyacinth —and to sink an- 
other half tub in the open sunshine for the 
nymphea. 
On this same level we established our rose 
bed, transplanting the bushes on September 
30th from other parts of the lot, being 
careful to lift them with an ample ball of 
earth. They promptly dropped all their 
leaves, but an abundance of water applied 
at the roots twice a week, brought out the 
dormant buds in a short time, and we had 
good bloom from Thanksgiving until after 
New Year’s. 
A bed of sweet blue violets (the ‘“ Princess,” 
which is one of the most satisfactory here, 
producing large fragrant blossoms on long 
stems) was set out from young plants about 
the same time with the roses and gave us 
Christmas bloom. Another bed, in which 
in early autumn we put young plants of 
gaillardia, began to bloom about New 
Year’s; and a patch of perennial coreopsis 
seedlings (C. /anceolata) planted at the same 
time, grew like weeds after the first winter 
rains fell, making pleasant mounds of fresh 
green foliage for us, followed in late Jan- 
uary by the flower heads. 
At the four posts of the pergola, we 
planted Tecoma jasminoides, which is a 
rapid grower, with beautiful, glossy, jasmine- 
like foliage, producing bloom both summer 
and winter; a star jasmine (7 vachelospermum 
jasminoides) which we found slow to climb, 
but desirable on account of the delicious 
fragrance of the white, starry flowers; a 
Plumbago Capensis, which may be trained 
either as a bush or a climber, and makes a 
cloud of lavender bloom three-fourths of 
the year; a heliotrope, which in Southern 
California often grows to the second story 
of the houses, and is a perpetual bloomer, 
though on frosty nights it needs the protec- 
tion of a sheet thrown over it. 
To provide some constant green about 
the pergola, we planted at both sides of 
the short path leading to it more Lippia 
A feature of our garden was the cactus bed, a 
miniature bit of desert 
