Time and the Tree 29 



land is an opportunity. It is not merely that 

 fruit-raising may be commercially profitable but 

 that it is a business worthy a man's best services. 

 In other words, there is a career in fruit-raising 

 as in war or mining, in printing, publishing, or 

 manufacturing. Fashion governs the world and 

 fruit-farming is in fashion. It is not a disgrace 

 to raise potatoes, or cherries, peaches, or grapes. 

 Is it a disgrace to raise puppies, or kittens, or 

 triple-combed roosters? Yet a cattery is not 

 precisely like a fruit-farm. 



In Cato's time every senator owned a huge piece 

 of Italy. Landownership meant aristocracy, and 

 to this day the landlord is the master among men. 

 Every nation, at some time, gets land-hungry and 

 it is land-hunger that keeps the world a military 

 camp. I know that there is a vociferous part of 

 mankind that calls property robbery and land- 

 ownership tyranny. Therefore, it says, ''Own 

 no land.** The more people the less land, yet the 

 land is no less. This inverse ratio of land and 

 people partly explains its appreciation. And as 

 fruit-lands are limited in extent and are uncommon, 

 such lands are most prized of all. These lands 

 are clocks on the earth's surface, marking time. 

 The fruit-grower knows his time-piece and so 

 regtilates his activities. He never winds the clock; 

 it is a perpetual self-winding time-piece. It tells 

 him when to plant and when to cultivate; when 

 to trim and when to gather the harvest. What 

 farmer ever carries a watch, save to a wedding, a 



