The year 1877 will long be remembered as exceptionally rainless and distressing.

Scarcely a flower bloomed on the dry valleys away from the stream-sides, and not a single grain-field depending upon rain was reaped.

The seed only sprouted, came up a little way, and withered.

Horses, cattle, and sheep grew thinner day by day, nibbling at bushes and weeds, along the shallowing edges of streams, many of which were dried up altogether, for the first time since the settlement of the country.
[Illustration: A BEE-RANCH ON A SPUR OF THE SAN GABRIEL RANGE.

CARDINAL FLOWER.] In the course of a trip I made during the summer of that year through Monterey, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Ventura, and Los Angeles counties, the deplorable effects of the drought were everywhere visible--leafless fields, dead and dying cattle, dead bees, and half-dead people with dusty, doleful faces.