It is an inspiring thing to realize what latent powers of 
beauty the desert holds even just beneath its surface, and to 
know that months or years of drought and heat will not destroy 
the seeds, the harvest of this bloom. ^ 
MiEA CuLiN Saunders. 
Santa Barbara Garden Club 
The Little Garden up the Canyon 
Prologue We were talking of California Gardens; I ashed my 
"Inspiration" what was the very first thing to do to start a 
garden there, if you were given a hare lot, and she replied "the 
first thing is to hire a little hoy with a hucket to pick snails, at 
ten cents a hundred, from under every conceivahle hiish. Engage 
him to keep it up as long as you have a garden, and he woidd 
hetter hring another little hoy with him, to pick up the slugs!" 
The Because I once lived in Santa Barbara, long before any of 
Garden you were born, when one either had to approach that Eden by 
OP MY stage-coach or sea, and because I have always acknowledged my 
Dreams home-sickness for that slice of Paradise (even stealing back seven 
years ago to find it as beautiful as ever) your Editor seems to 
think that I can write intelligently of planting a California 
garden. Such writing would have been more from my heart than 
from my head, had it not been that Mrs. Herter, who planned the 
exquisite Mirasol Gardens, consented to go over the lists of 
California plants with me, commenting, suggesting and inspiring 
as well as refreshing my memory. 
I have often made believe that I had a tiny one storied adobe 
house up Rattle-snake Canyon Road, where the ground slopes to 
the south, the mountains tower behind and to the west is that 
view of the mesas with the sea beyond . , . here I pretend 
that the gods have given me an acre of ground and water connec- 
tion, and if you care to come with me I '11 tell you what I would 
plant there. The plan would do as well for a cottage in the town, 
but it should have an outlook towards the south. 
Trees ^ would build my house near some old Live-oaks so I might 
plant mauve Star Cinerarias under their outmost branches. Then 
I would have some tall Eucalyptus trees in a group towards the 
north, especially the graceful lemon-scented, E. citriodora, and 
the pink flowered ones. A large group of feathery Acacias I 
must have ; indeed, I would like all the twenty-five listed varieties, 
but to begin with, A. Baileyana; A. dealhata and A. pycnantha 
would do. Some Orange, Avocado and Loquat trees should be 
near the house and in the choicest position should be a Jacaranda 
mimesrefolia, smothered in early summer with its entrancing 
bluish bloom. 
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