House and Garden 
FIG. 8-APPROACH TO A RANCH HOME, SHOWING PARTS OF THE GARDEN 
blossoms in whirls which presents a fascinating field 
for the humming birds \^hich throng the gardens 
here. Beyond it, and as a background are loquat trees, 
and hack of them a wall or trellis of fuchsias growing 
to the astonishino; heig-ht of ten feet or more. 
Even in the street in midwinter one sees vast 
mounds of bloom in unexpected 
places, the rough bark or trunk of the 
big fan palm. Fig. 4, being covered 
with pink ivy geraniums often present¬ 
ing a solid mass of color. 
One need not confine himself to 
towns alone to observe the beautiful 
in landscape gardening and house 
decoration under favorable and semi¬ 
tropic conditions. The ranches, 
particularly the large ones, afford 
unlimited field for the searcher after 
the picturesque. In the old days the 
cheapest and most available fence for 
the missions was the cactus or tuna 
bed and when it reaches its greatest 
height it becomes a picturesque fea¬ 
ture of the landscape, winding away 
over the semi-desert like some strange 
weird monster. Each bright green leaf 
is armed with stiff spines also hunches 
of very minute ones, while upon the 
leaf edge grows the pear-shaped tuna 
FIG. 5—CACTUS OR TUNA 
or fruit, also covered with minute darts, Fig 5. 
The tuna when ripe is a rich purple, and very good 
when the taste has been acquired, but many are its 
victims, especially the “tender foot,” who discovers 
its dangers too late. Once when walking over the 
mountains of Santa Catalina I came upon two ladies 
one standing with her mouth open and 
tongue out to an extraordinary extent, 
while the other was endeavoring to 
pick from it the countless minute 
darts of the tuna which she had bitten 
into. History repeats itself, even if it 
is sacred: the lady had eaten of for¬ 
bidden fruit. 
The island of Catalina is a beautiful 
winter garden in itself, eighteen or 
more miles from land out in the Pacific, 
and is a treasure ground for the 
botanist and lover of gardens. 
The canon sides are green with the 
wild lilac, and the so-called holly 
which is covered with berries during 
the winter months is picked and car¬ 
ried to Los Angeles by the islanders 
as “Christmas holly.” In one of the 
gardens all the island trees have been 
gathered and a most interesting cac¬ 
tus garden comprising many rare 
species is seen. Among the rare plants 
6 
