a fort like a European noble of the feudal times, had an army of Indians at his command, and occasionally made war on the predatory tribes who were his neighbors, now lives upon a small annuity granted him by the State of California.  He saved little, I have heard, from the wreck of his fortunes; and of all who were with him in his earlier days, but one, so far as I know—­General Bidwell, of Chico, an able and honorable gentleman, once Sutter’s manager—­had the ability to provide for the future by retaining possession of his own estate of twenty thousand acres, now by general consent the finest farm in California.

As you go north in California the amount of rain-fall increases.  In San Diego County they are happy with ten inches per annum, and fortunate if they get five; in Santa Barbara, twelve and a half inches insure their crops; the Sacramento Valley has an average rain-fall of about twenty inched, and eighteen inches insure them a full crop on soil properly prepared.  In 1873 they had less, yet the crops did well wherever the farmers had summer-fallowed the land.  This practice is now very general, and is necessary, in order that the grain may have the advantage of the early rains.  When a farmer plows and prepares his land in the spring, lets it lie all summer, and sows his grain in November just as the earliest rain begins, he need not fear for his crop.

There is less difference in climate than one would suppose between the Sacramento and the San Joaquin valleys.  Cattle and sheep live out-of-doors, and support themselves all the year round in the Shasta Valley on the north as constantly as in Los Angeles or any other of the southern counties.  The seasons are a little later north than south, but the difference is slight; and as far north as Red Bluff, in the interior, they begin their harvest earlier than in Monterey County, far south but on the coast.  Snow rarely lies on the ground in the northern counties more than a day.  The best varieties of the foreign grapes are hardy everywhere.  Light frosts come in December; and in the flower-gardens the geranium withers to the ground, but springs up from the roots again in March.  The eucalyptus flourishes wherever it has been planted in Northern California; and as far north as Redding, at the head of the valley, the mercury very rarely falls below twenty-five degrees, and remains there but a few hours.

[Illustration:  WINE VATS.]

As you travel from Marysville, either northward or southward, you will see before and around you a great wide plain, bounded on the west by the blue outlines of the Coast Range, and on the east by the foot-hills of the Sierra:  a great level, over which as far as your eye can reach are scattered groves of grand and picturesque white oaks, which relieve the solitude of the plain, and make it resemble a well-planted park.  Wherever the valley is settled, you will see neat board fences, roomy barns, and farm-houses nestling