154 HISTORY OF CALIFORNIA. 



" The absence of timber and the continuance of the 

 dry season are apt to be regarded by farmers, on first 

 going into the country, as irremediable defects, and as 

 presenting obstacles, almost insurmountable, to the 

 successful progress of agriculture. A little experience 

 will modify these opinions. 



" It is soon ascertained that the soil will produce 

 abundantly without manure ; that flocks and herds 

 sustain themselves through the winter without being 

 fed at the farm-yard, and, consequently, no labor is 

 necessary to provide forage for them ; that ditches are 

 easily dug, which present very good barriers for the 

 protection of crops, until live fences can be planted, 

 and have time to grow. Forest trees may be planted 

 with little labor, and in very few years attain a suffi- 

 cient size for building and fencing purposes. Time 

 may be usefully employed in sowing various grain and 

 root crops during the wet or winter season. There is 

 no weather cold enough to destroy root crops, and, 

 therefore, it is not necessary to gather them. They 

 can be used or sold from the field where they grow. 

 The labor, therefore, required in most of the old 

 States to fell the forests, clear the land of rubbish, 

 and prepare it for seed, may here be applied to other 

 objects. 



" All these things, together with the perfect security 

 of all crops in harvest time, from injury by wet 

 weather, are probably sufficient to meet any expense 

 which may be incurred in irrigation, or caused, for a 

 time, by a scanty supply of timber. 



" In the northern part of the territory, above lati- 

 tude 39°, and on the hills which rise from the great 

 plain of the Sacramento and San Joaquin to the foot 

 of the Sierra Nevada, the forests of timber are beau- 



