234 Appendix. 



In addition to tliese markets, we have the Orient, not only our new acqui- 

 sitions of Hawaai and Philippine Islands, but Japan, China, and Russian pos- 

 sessions. 



Hon. W. II. Seward, in a speech delivered in the United States Senate as 

 far back as 1852, said: '"The Pacific Ocean, its shores, its islands, and the 

 vast region beyond, will become the chief theater of events in the world's great 

 hereafter." 



This hereafter is here right now, perhaps much sooner than this great 

 statesman anticipated, but he did not know then that he was standing at the 

 threshold of an electrical age, where events pass with lightning rapidity, and 

 what is new to-day is old to-morrow. The new fields opened out to us offer an 

 exceptional opportunity for the promoter. 



The first authentic statistics we have showing the exportation of fresh 

 fruits to Oriental markets is the year 1898, and were as follows : British 

 East India. $12,340; British Australia, $260,611; other Asiatic possessions 

 and Oceanic, $147,151; Hong Kong, $67,718; others parts of China. $23,761: 

 Japan, 22,713. These exports have more than quadrupled since. In conver- 

 sation with the various American consuls, especially in Japan, they assured 

 me repeatedly that the demand and consumption for our fruits was increasing 

 steadily. While at Yokohama I saw five-tier apples sold at $5 and $6 per 

 box ; at Kobe an inferior lot in damaged condition brought $3.50 per box. so 

 eager were those people for our fresh apples, and yet these latter boxes of 

 apples would not have sold for 50 cents here. All these are markets of great 

 importance, which should and must be cultivated, and as we have little or no 

 competition, they are practically our own. I am firmly convinced that in 

 these districts alone there is a field for operation that will absorb all the sur- 

 plus fruit raised in the Pacific Northwest. But in reaching out for these foreign 

 markets, we must concentrate our strength, ship only flrst-class fruits, honestly 

 graded, honestly packed, and honestly labeled. To do otherwise, is commercial 

 suicide. 



In a recent address at a fruitgrowers' convention the President of the 

 State Horticultural Society of Oregon said : "Looking over the whole State, 

 then, may we not summarize and add that among the varied resources of the 

 great commonwealth of Oregon, potent in its capacity for contributing to the 

 national development of the State to its proper position as one of the foremost 

 States in the Union, it is not at all too much to say that fruit-growing, if not 

 destined to take the first rank, is certainly capable of being expanded into the 

 equal of any. Neither Oregon's forests, its mines, its fisheries, its farms, dairies, 

 cattle ranges, sheep walks, nor its manufactories will, in their future growth, 

 be entitled to outrank its orchards if proper methods are adopted by the horti- 

 culturists of the State." 



"Here, under the peculiar climatic conditions by which we are surrounded, 

 blessed as we are by fertile and responsive soil, is, as has been fully demon- 

 strated, the natural habitat of the apple, the pear, the quince, the plum and 

 the prune, in all its varieties. Here, in select localities, flourish the peach, 

 the apricot, the almond and walnut. Here, under intelligently considered con- 

 ditions, the grape, the fig, the pomegranate, the medlar pear, the Japanese 

 persimmon grow to maturity, ripen and become useful and agreeable adjuncts 

 of the farm and home. Melons and berries are at home here ; and in sh(n-t, 

 it may be said that, excepting the citrus and semi-tropical fruits, Oregon offers 

 to the fruitgrower an exceptionally attractive field for the exercise of all his 

 faculties in this important and most attractive branch of business of the tiller 

 of the soil." 



I am firmly of the opinion that with our new acquisitions in the Orient, 

 the markets of Japan and China now fairly opened to us, and that as soon 

 as the I'anama canal is finished, in the construction and completion of which 

 we here in Oregon are particularly interested, it will bring about great results 

 for the Oregon farmer and fruitgrower. Meats have been transported in cold- 



