GOLDEN GATE DISTRICT FAIR ASSOCIATION. 205 



all, is dilapidated; there is no front yard; the small back yard is 

 dirty and lumbered up with boxes and coal, or other trash, because 

 there is no other place for them; no place for shade trees, and but a 

 scanty carpet if any on the floor; the furniture is worn, and nothing 

 looks cheerful about the place, unless the forced smile of the poor 

 wife and mother, who struggles to meet the husband who comes from 

 his daily task with a cheerful face ; but sickness at times comes like 

 a great shadow across the door; and then how dark and gloomy is 

 the greeting home. Such is rather more than the average dwelling 

 of the industrious workingmen in the cities. Many of them are 

 obliged to live in tenement houses, crowded together like bees in a 

 hive; sometimes two families in a single room. As for the children, 

 even of the best, they roam the streets subject to the influence of 

 vice in every form. How can any farmer wish for a moment to 

 exchange his lot for such as this? And is it any wonder that so 

 many of our great men come from the country? I am not insensi- 

 ble to the fact that there are periods when the farmer finds the times 

 hard, and prices for the products of his farm not sufficiently remu- 

 nerative to leave any profit after paying his bills; but reverses come 

 in every vocation of life. So don't get discouraged because the price 

 of wheat is low this year, but get a few more sheep, hogs, and cattle, 

 it costs but very little to raise them, and they always command ready 

 money in the market. Also plant more cherry and other fruit trees 

 and vines; raise your own vegetables, instead of buying from the 

 gardener who lives on the creek ; because you can sink a well on 

 your ranch, and set a windmill to work pumping water, that will 

 make your garden teem with all the wonders of the vegetable king- 

 dom. Perhaps, if times are a little hard with you, it is because you 

 want to own too much land. Don't try to buy all the land next to 

 your farm, or own more land than you can successfully cultivate. If 

 you have it, sell off a part of it in lots to some industrious man, 

 even if he has no other capital than industry and honesty, and let 

 him build up a home for himself and family. You will have a good 

 neighbor, and in time he will pay you; and to you will come the 

 double satisfaction of knowing that you have aided a worthy family, 

 and at the same time added to the value of your remaining property 

 by having it surrounded by other lands under a higher state of 

 improvements. 



A few words before I close, in relation to the future growth of our 

 State, sitting here, as she does, on the broad shores of the Pacific, 

 where the Occident seems to blend with the Orient. We have here 

 the largest State in the Union except Texas. It contains one hun- 

 dred and eighty-eight thousand nine hundred and ninety-one square 

 miles, or one hundred and twenty million nine hundred and forty- 

 eight thousand four hundred and eighty acres of land and water. It 

 is seven hundred and seventy miles long in its greatest length, and 

 has an average width of two hundred and thirty miles. Most of this 

 vast area, more than seventy per cent, of it, is good land, suitable for 

 cultivation in grain, wine, etc., or for grazing; the balance is water 

 or timber. The soil is, in many places, exceedingly fertile, and in 

 nearly all it is capable, with proper cultivation, of producing some 

 crop, or yielding good pasturage. The climate is, perhaps, the most 

 salubrious in the world. It is well calculated to incite the popula- 

 tion to the highest energy and to stimulate them to the greatest 

 achievements. As yet our population is less than one million. If 



