118 ASPARAGUS 
the first quality, excepi that dry steam only is used in 
sterilization. After going through the blanching 
process the tips are put in round cans, four inches in 
diameter and five inches high. After soldering up 
these cans they are put in the retorts, which are three 
feet square, each containing five hundred cans, and 
treated with steam two hundred and fifty pounds to 
the inch. The cans remain in these retorts half an 
hour. Then they are taken out, vented, put back 
again, and remain under the same pressure another 
half hour, when the work is completed. 
By rigid economy even in the most minute detail, 
and by the skill required in the knowledge of canning, 
asparagus can now be had at a reasonable price at all 
seasons of the year, which is a boon to both producer 
and consumer. At $14.00 per one hundred bunches 
for No. 1 and $7.00 per hundred bunches for No. 2, 
or culls, asparagus is one of the most profitable of 
agricultural crops, and even at one-half these prices 
it is a much better paying crop than potatoes at 50 
cents per bushel. 
Pacific Coast methods.—Canning and preserving of 
asparagus in California is carried on on as grand a 
scale as are most other undertakings. An idea of the 
extent and importance of this comparatively new 
industry may readily be conceived when it is considered 
that one establishment alone, The Hickmott Asparagus 
Canning Co., on Bouldin Island, in the San Joaquin 
River, has recently shipped an entire train-load of 
canned asparagus from San Francisco to New York. 
This train consisted of fifteen freight-cars containing 
600 cases each, making a total of 9,000 cases, averag- 
