All this profusion makes one feel that it is no trick to get a living out of this very impulsive soil, but before buying a plot of one’s own, it is wise to see the seasons through.  California is a very unexpected country.  You see a snug little ranch, good soil, near a railroad, just what you were looking for, but three months of the year it may be under water.  After the spring rains we once went for a change of air to one of the beaches, which we particularly disliked, because it was the only place that we could get to, bridges being out in all directions.  For the same reason it was so packed with other visitors, maybe as unwilling as we, that we had a choice of sleeping in the park or taking a small apartment belonging to a Papa and Mama Dane.  It was full of green plush and calla lilies, but we chose it in preference to the green grass and calla lilies of the park.  We passed an uneasy and foggy week there.  I slept in a bed which disappeared into a bureau and J——­ on a lounge that curled up like a jelly roll by day.  Mama Dane gave us breakfast in the family sitting-room where a placard hung, saying, “God hears all that you say.”  J——­ and I took no chances, and ate in silence.  Anyway, the eggs were fresh.  We explored the country as well as we could in the fog, and found quite a large part of it well under water.  On one ranch we met a morose gentleman in hip boots, wading about his property, which looked like a pretty lake with an R. F. D. box sticking up here and there like a float on a fishing line, while a gay party of boys and girls were rowing through an avenue of pepper trees in an old boat.  The gentleman in the hip boots had bought his place in summer!  J——­ and I decided then and there that if we ever bought any property in California, it would be in the midst of the spring rains, but we know now that even that wouldn’t be safe—­another element has to be reckoned with besides water—­fire.

Of course Rain in California is spelled with a capital R. Noah spelled it that way, but we didn’t before we came West.  It swells the streams, which in summer are nothing but trickles, to rushing torrents in no time.  Bridges snap like twigs, dams burst, telegraph lines collapse; rivers even change their courses entirely, if they feel like it, so that it would really be a good idea to build extra bridges wherever it seemed that a temperamental river might decide to go.  I have heard of a farmer who wrote to one of the railroads, saying, “Will you please come and take your bridge away from my bean-field?  I want to begin ploughing.”

This adds natural hazards to the real-estate game.  There are others—­Fire, as I said a moment ago.  I have a very profound respect for the elements since we have come West to live.  A forest fire is even more terrifying than a flood, and in spite of the eagle eyes of the foresters many are the lovely green slopes burned over each year.  I have seen a brush fire marching over a hill across the canyon from us, like an army with banners—­flying our colors of orange and yellow—­driving terrified rabbits and snakes ahead of it, and fought with the fervor of Crusaders by the property owners in its path.