STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 211 



soil could not, on account of obstacles in the Avay of irrigation, be over- 

 come ; here in California labor is performed even in the most sultry 

 valleys during: ^11 hours of the day and at all seasons of the year. On 

 my farm at Chico, in this valley, where we claim to have a reasonable 

 degree of heat, especially in time of harvest, I can scarcely remember 

 an instance of a hand becoming sick in the harvest field. Perhaps SiOme 

 will say we don't kill ourselves with work at Chico. In reply, IVill 

 answer that we do not; and what is more, we do not intend to do so. 

 I will tell you what we did do. ^Ye harvested the present season, during 

 the liottest part of the summer, cut, threshed, cleaned, and put in the 

 granarj^, ready for market, forty thousand six hundred and eighteen 

 bushels of grain ; three fourths of it wheat, and the remainder oats and 

 barley, in thirty-six daj's, including all delays by breakages and other 

 causes, averaging one thousand one hundred and twenty-eight and a 

 quarter bushels per day, with an average of twenty-two hands, all told. 



Now then, can men work in this valley ? You have my answer, which 

 is the best proof I am able to give. It is true the climate in some locali- 

 ties is somewhat miasmatic and productive of intermittent fevers, but 

 the causes, local and transient in their character, can and will be re- 

 moved. Until this can be accomplished, I would suggest that residences 

 in such localities should be so constructed as to afford sleeping apart- 

 ments in the upper story, and thus enable the dwellers along the margins 

 of rivers, and in the vicinity of sloughs and tule lands, to escape from 

 inhaling from the lowest stratum of air during the night. In regard to 

 the aridity of certain portions of this State, and the apparent sterility 

 o'f large tracts of land before referred to, we have the means of tlieir 

 complete reclamation at hand. The great remedy is irrigation. Differ- 

 ent from Spain, all the streams of this valley, even our largest rivers, 

 can be made available for purposes of irrigation. 



Some have pretended to believe that irrigation was detrimental, and 

 therefore not to be recommended. So is food, or any other useful and 

 indispensable thing, detrimental if not used in a proper manner, in proper 

 quantities, and at proper times. Time will not permit me to give even 

 a faint idea of what I conceive to be the great importance of irrigation. 

 It is such that it should, in my opinion, con^mand the attention of the 

 State and be a subject of State regulation The short and partial expe- 

 rience already had in many localities has proved that even the most 

 barren places, when irrigated, will produce the ver}^ best of grapes, 

 fruits, and other products. In fine, such are the wonderful capabilities 

 of the soil of California, that irrigation, properly conducted and applied 

 to these barren hills, and plains, and mountains, would awake them as if 

 by magic into such fertility, and life, and beauty, and fruitfulncss, as to 

 astonish even Californians themselves. The canals for irrigation should 

 be made upon a system so as to harmonize with the reclamation of 

 swamp and tule lands, and equalize the distribution of water for the 

 benefit of all. Constructed upon an extensive scale, these canals, under 

 proper regulations, could be made useful to conduct away the surplus 

 waters in seasons of heavy floods, and thereby prevent the destructive 

 effects of inundations. They would create sites and water power for 

 mills and other machinery, and besides be available for purj)oscs of navi- 

 gation. The rivers of this portion of the State are becoming so rapidly 

 filled up as to thi-eaten the total destruction of navigation. The raising 

 of the beds of rivers by continual deposition from the mines, while it 

 destroys navigation and increases the danger from floods, diminishes the 

 labor of transferring the waters into artificial channels. Preservation 



