He was
going to settle among these canyon boulders, and make money, and marry
a Spanish woman.
People mine for irrigating water along the foothills
as for gold. He is now driving a prospecting tunnel into a spur of
the mountains back of his cabin. "My prospect is good," he said, "and
if I strike a strong flow, I shall soon be worth five or ten thousand
dollars. That flat out there, " he continued, referring to a small,
irregular patch of gravelly detritus that had been sorted out and
deposited by Eaton Creek during some flood season, "is large enough
for a nice orange grove, and, after watering my own trees, I can sell
water down the valley; and then the hillside back of the cabin will do
for vines, and I can keep bees, for the white sage and black sage up
the mountains is full of honey. You see, I've got a good thing." All
this prospective affluence in the sunken, boulder-choked flood-bed of
Eaton Creek! Most home-seekers would as soon think of settling on the
summit of San Antonio.
Half an hour's easy rambling up the canyon brought me to the foot of
"The Fall," famous throughout the valley settlements as the finest yet
discovered in the range. It is a charming little thing, with a voice
sweet as a songbird's, leaping some thirty-five or forty feet into a
round, mirror pool. The cliff back of it and on both sides is
completely covered with thick, furry mosses, and the white fall shines
against the green like a silver instrument in a velvet case.
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