164 KESOURCES OF CALIFORNIA. 



brethren. Throughout the United States, the system has pre- 

 vailed of permitting horses, cattle, sheep, and hogs, to run at 

 large, with no right of indemnity for any damage which they 

 might do in cultivated fields, unless surrounded by a " lawful 

 fence." This may be a good system for the pioneer, who tills 

 little land, and wishes his horses and cattle to have a wide 

 range ; and it was well suited to the pastoral life of the Span- 

 ish Californians previous to the American conquest: but it is 

 of doubtful policy as applied to the present condition of afiairs, 

 at least in the principal rigricultural valleys, where all the land 

 is under })lough. For instance, in the Alameda plain, along 

 the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay — a district fifty miles 

 long by three wide, and containing one hundred and fifty 

 square miles, of which one hundred and twenty-five are culti- 

 vated — there are five hundred farms, and probably two hun- 

 dred miles of fencing, made at a cost of one hundred thousand 

 dollars. This is a severe tax upon farming, and it is levied 

 chiefly to protect the grain and fruit-trees from the depreda- 

 tions of horses and cattle belonging to neighbors and strangers. 

 A farmer would rarely go to the expense of fencing his own 

 cattle and horses out : it Avould be much cheaper for him to 

 keep them in a yard or stable. 



The legislature has prescribed what kind of a fence is "law- 

 ful ;" and if any domesticated animal breaks through a lawful 

 fence, its owner is liable for the damage done in the enclosure; 

 and if the trespass be repeated by any neglect of the owner of 

 the animal, he is liable for double damages. The farmer may 

 take up the trespassing animal as an estray; but if he injure 

 or kill it, he becomes responsible to the owner. The require- 

 ments of lawful fence are not the same in all parts of the state. 

 In the counties of Butte, Amador, Tuolumne, Calaveras, San 

 Diego, Nevada, San Bernardino, Colusi, Placer, Santa Barbara, 

 Yuba, Shasta, Klamath, Trinity, and Siskiyou, " every enclo- 

 sure" (I quote the words of the statute) " shall be deemed a 

 lawful fence which is four and a half feet high, if made of 

 stone ; and if made of rails, five and a half feet high ; if made 



