SANTA ROSA 255 



The following year, 1878, the total return 

 from the nursery sales was $84. 



The third year the sales amounted to $353.28. 



The fourth year they came to $702. And it 

 was not until 1881, when the nursery had been 

 for five years in operation, that the aggregate 

 returns from the sale of its products of all 

 descriptions passed the thousand dollar mark. 

 The specific figure, in 1881, was $1,112.69. 



The figures thus baldly presented tell their 

 own story. They show that the nursery busi- 

 ness in California forty-five years ago was in 

 far different condition from what it is to-day. 



Within ten years the quality of the trees and 

 the reliability of the stock in general of the Bur- 

 bank Nursery had become so widely known that 

 I was selling more than $16,000 worth of stock 

 per year. In the light of this ultimate prosper- 

 ity, the privations of the earlier years may very 

 well be minimized, even though they cannot quite 

 be forgotten. 



There are many incidents of that early period 

 of probation, when struggling to establish myself 

 as a nurseryman, in order that ultimately I might 

 take up my plans for plant development on a 

 large scale, that would have a measure of interest 

 and would not be without importance in their 

 bearing on the later work ; but I must content my- 



