all in ivory; feather fans with ivory or sandal wood carved sticks; toys, such as a dozen eggs in decreasing size packed one within another, tiny tortoises with quivering heads and legs in glass topped green boxes, or perplexing pieces of wood cut into such strange shapes that it took much skill and time to replace the blocks if once disturbed; there was exquisite embroidery, shawls, or silk handkerchiefs, sometimes there was one of the queer hanging baskets of flowers and fruit fashioned from feathers, silk and tinsel, that so delighted the Chinese themselves but which the housewives rather dreaded receiving as New Year gifts from devoted servants; to top off there was always the strange candy, ginger and lichee nuts. How could so many things come out of those baskets!
If the Chinaman was an essential part of the housekeeping, the Mexican was an integral part of the ranch proper. When Mr. Temple lived at the Cerritos he had great numbers of humble retainers who lived for the most part in huts or jacals of tule or willow brush; some of the more favored ones stayed in the wings facing the patio and others occupied the older Cota house that stood near the river.
My cousin, George, who lived at the ranch all his boyhood, once wrote of these people: “The men of these families had been accustomed to work occasionally as vaqueros in the service of the rancho. There was always plenty of meat; and frijoles and chili, with mais del pais were to be raised under crude forms of cultivation at the foot of the hill. On account of the death by starvation of the cattle on the over-stocked
