304 AUTOBIOGRAPHY 



thriving village or " city " as many modest 

 towns are called out here you will dis- 

 cover that every second man you meet owns a 

 " ranch." In a few minutes' conversation you will 

 discover also that his holding consists of only two, 

 five, ten or at most twenty acres and that it is for 

 sale or for trade, for cash or other equities. When 

 I first came to California it seemed to me that 

 everybody's place was for sale ; which is merely to 

 say that the Californian is adventurous and ready 

 always to move on to something new. 



If his ranch is bare land he prices it at $150 to 

 $200 per acre; if set to trees or vines at $300 to 

 $350; if there is a habitable house, a shack of a 

 stable and a well, the price will run from $350 to 

 $450; and if the plantings are in full bearing and 

 all the necessary appliances are on hand for irri- 

 gating, tilling, harvesting and marketing the crop, 

 the price will be $600 to $1,000 per acre. This 

 figure may include several hundred or perhaps a 

 thousand trays, boxes and the like, for everything 

 even the work stock, cows and chickens goes 

 with the land. As our forbears would have said: 

 "All the hereditaments thereunto belonging." 

 When a Californian sells out he takes only his 

 household goods with him. 



