CURRENT PUBLICATIONS IN RURAL ART. 517 
This question is just beginning to be agitated, because, perhaps, stock-keepers have 
heretofore predominated, and it would have cost more to fence the stock than the grain ; 
now the thing is reversed, and it costs ten, yes, twenty, times, the amount to fence the 
grain that it does the stock. Should we not, then, weleome any measure of relief from 
this burdensome tax of making and keeping in repair so much superfluous fence ? 
The importance of irrigation is forcibly presented in the address of 
the Hon. Geo. Barstow : 
Next to railroads, we want canals for irrigation, but constructed with sufficient 
depth to make them navigable. The seasons of California are two: one of copious 
moisture, commencing on the 1st of November and closing on the Ist of May; the other 
is rainless, and extends from the ist of May to the ist of November. Could we moisten 
the earth during these last six mouths, the productiveness of the State would be abso- 
lutely without limit. Many rich mines have been opened in California, and their har- 
vest of gold, by lubricating the machinery of manufacturing and commercial industry, 
has enriched the world. But no country has profited by it so little as the State which 
produced it. There yet remains one mine, however, richer than Ophir, exhaustless as 
the sea, the treasures of which are in store for the people of California whenever they 
choose to appropriate them. I mean the melting snow of the Sierra Nevada mountains, 
which the suns of summer send down in fertilizing streams upon the arid plains. We 
* 
have but to utilize them to find them a source of boundless wealth. 3 % 
* There is no country in which irrigation can be more easily applied now, if we ex- 
cept India, upon so grand a scale as in California. A survey, already made, demon- 
strates the practicability of watering more than three quarters of a million of acres on 
the right bank of the Sacramento River, by a canal issuing from that stream, near Red 
Bluff, leading along the outward edge of the valley, and having its outlet at Suisun ; 
and it is probable that the drainage of the Coast range of mountains would swell the 
irrigating capacity of that canal to one million of acres. Large as this area is, a still 
larger one can be irrigated by collecting in a canal the streams heading in the Sierras 
and flowing into the wide plain on the left bank of the Sacramento and the vast basins 
of the San Joaquin and Tulare. 
CURRENT PUBLICATIONS IN RURAL ART. 
We give short abstracts of the new American books on agriculture 
and rural economy that have been published during the past year. We 
have aimed at furnishing information only as to their contents and char- 
acter, by abstracts of their more prominent points, with now and then 
an illustrative quotation, but offering no criticism, indorsement, or gen- 
eral commendation. It must be an object to the numerous readers of 
this Report to know what works have been recently published on agri- 
culture, with a general view of their contents. A great improvement 
is every year visible in the originality of this branch of American liter- 
ature, and its adaptability to the requirements of the country, so dif- 
ferent from the numerous reprints of the English works, which formerly 
furnished the staple of this kind of reading for American farmers. 
Pracu CuLtTure. By James Alexander Fulton, Dover, Delaware. Illustrated. 188 
pages, 12mo. New York:. Orange Judd & Co., 1870. 
Within a few years fruit-growing has increased to such an extent as to 
become a leading interest. Many horticultural associations and period- 
icals have been established to advance this interest; and these period- 
icals haye been conducted with great ability and with corresponding 
success. Of thesefruits the peach has become one of the most import- 
ant, being easily raised, coming soon into bearing, and a favorite 
with almost all tastes. The area of its culture is tast widening, and 
thousands of acres are now devoted to peach orchards where, but 
a few years ago, none were known. It can be successfully cultivated 
almost anywhere under our bright skies, south of 42°, and below an 
