334 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



quickly as possible. It cost me one dollar and fifty-six cents to 

 find out the difference between a bushel of apples and a bushel 

 of apples. 



Picking and husking the almonds cost us exactly fifty dollars 

 a ton, and our neighbors all the way up to twice that. Outside of 

 my own family we employed a varying number of Chinamen, up 

 to nine. The task lasted from the 18th of September to the 28th 

 of October. The boxes picked each day are gathered in the even- 

 ing and conveyed to the drying-yard, where the nuts are sun-dried 

 for a few days. Then comes the bleaching, which is done with 

 the fumes of sulphur, and requires care and some experience. 



The bleaching-box is built in various fashions, but covered 

 with tongued and grooved boards and in other ways made tight, 

 so as to confine the sulphur-smoke as much as possible. In com- 

 mon orchards it is about six feet square and six or seven high. It 

 is a complete inverted box, and often movable. The drying-trays 

 are slid in on cleats like the draws of a cabinet. Almonds, being 

 dried before they are bleached, are sprinkled or sprayed with 

 clean water just before sulphuring, the moisture being necessary 

 to make the sulphur do its work of bleaching. The proper 

 quantity of sulphur for one bleaching is put into a pan, ignited, 

 and set inside the bleaching-box. The doors are closed tightly, 

 and left so until the sulphur is all burned. The almonds are then 

 taken out and dried again for a few hours, to remove the moisture 

 sprayed upon them before bleaching. 



If they come out bright and evenly bleached, the grower's 

 heart beats more quickly. He knows that it is the color that sells 

 his almonds. Consumers may growl as much as they please, and 

 preach on the sin of poisoning their fruit with sulphur-fumes, 

 but they will always buy the poisoned ( ?) fruit and give a much 

 higher price for it. They may pat the honest grower of unbleached 

 fruit on the back, but trust them never to give him a penny's 

 worth of encouragement in the market. To-day my paper quotes 

 unbleached apricots at two to four cents a pound, and those that 

 are bleached, or " sulphur-poisoned," at five to six and a half 

 cents. All these prices preclude living profits. Who knows how 

 many growers of unbleached fruit this year's ruinous prices will 

 drive off their farms and out of business, to make room for a like 

 number of sulphur-poisoners ? And, going back to the apple 

 merchants and butter dealers, we must admit the full force of 

 the same apology for their crookedness. 



But aside from the fact that the fruit-grower is held, much 

 against his inclination, by his final consumers to his questionable 

 trick of trade, the question is still open whether it really does 

 them any harm. Sulphuric acid, like many poisons, is a medi- 

 cine in proper doses. Does a tablespoonful or two of well- 



