AMERICAN BEE JOURNAL. 



597 



" artist" succeeded in accomplishing liis 

 or her object, goes without saying, still, I 

 should have been better pleased to have 

 seen several hundred pretty jars of San 

 Diego sage honey, as well as a ton or 

 two of white comb honey, to all the ar- 

 tistic effects that might hav'e been at- 

 tempted. 



The largest display of honey, bees- 

 wax and implements used in the apiary 

 made at the Fair is that of L. E. Mercer, 

 of Ventura. This is the great honey ex- 

 hibitor and prize-taker at the county or 

 district fairs in the Golden State. From 

 long experience Mr. Mercer has come to 

 know how to get up an attractive show. 

 His display in the Ventura county sec- 

 tion of the Southern California building 

 is worthy of separate notice, and in or- 

 der to do it justice I shall leave it until 

 my next letter — in fact, the notice of 

 this display will wind up all the exhibits 

 of honey or other apiarian exhibits at 

 the Midwinter Exposition that I have 

 been able to find. 



North Temescal, Calif. 



Pure Italians— California ys. Florida. 



Written Jor the American Bee Journal 

 BY DK. E. GALLUP. 



Now, Mr. Stinger, do you pretend to 

 say that if your light-skinned, light- 

 haired, light blue-eyed German marries 

 with a dark-skinned, dark-haired and 

 dark-eyed Italian, the offspring will be 

 pure Italian ? The cross may be a good 

 one, but don't palm them off as pure 

 Italians on the unsuspecting. There is 

 where the objection comes in, with me. 



Now in reply to Dr. Oren, of Daytona, 

 Fla. (see page 282.) W. A. Pryal gave 

 him a good send off, but let me hit him a 

 little. We can pick ripe fruit from the 

 tree or vine here at any season in the 

 entire year. It is a well known fact 

 that lemons are in bloom, the fruit is 

 setting, growing and ripening at all 

 times. In picking it has to be gathered 

 from three to four times in the year. 

 The fruit is picked green as soon as it 

 attains a suitable size. They have to be 

 matured and cured off the tree. Another 

 fact: A lemon that is allowed to ripen 

 on the tree is entirely worthless in the 

 market. It took our lemon raisers a long 

 time to ascertain this fact, but now our 

 lemons will stand the test alongside of 

 any from any part of the globe. 



This State raises oranges, and first- 

 class ones, almost to its northern limit, 

 and they ripen in the north part of the 



State within a month as early as they 

 do in Florida. Here we have an early, 

 and late ripening varieties, so we can 

 pick from the tree at nearly all seasons 

 of the year. Still, our season for ship- 

 ping is from February until June. I 

 have picked as fine eating oranges as I 

 ever tasted, in August and September. 



So are our winters warm and pleasant, 

 and our summers are as much more 

 pleasant than y^urs, as you can imag- 

 ine. You, or the most of Eastern people 

 that do not know, associate our winters 

 with the rainy season in Oregon or 

 Washington, which is a grand mistake. 

 Our bee-keepers' firewood only costs the 

 labor of cutting right at their doors, as 

 it were, and live-oak at that. Here in 

 the valley we raise our firewood from 

 the seed in four years, and once plant- 

 ing lasts for all time, for when we cut it 

 off it shoots right up from the stump 

 again. If I should tell you what a tre- 

 mendous growth an Australian gum-tree 

 makes under favorable circumstances, 

 you would and could not believe me, and 

 it makes splendid firewood. 



No irrigation is needed here, either, 

 to raise one crop in ordinary seasons, 

 but where we raise three to six crops on 

 the same land in a year, we irrigate. 

 Still we have thousands of acres in. this 

 county that needs no irrigation what- 

 ever. 



We also have thousands of artesian 

 wells costing all the way from $20 up 

 into the thousands, with the purest kind 

 of water. Myself and son-in-law bought 

 40 acres of as good land as ever lay out- 

 doors, on which we could raise one crop 

 of corn, grain, potatoes, or almost any 

 crop, without irrigation. But we had 

 an artesian well that furnished water to 

 irrigate 100 acres for the second, third, 

 and fourth crops, or six crops of lucerne, 

 and two months of pasture every year. 



When it comes to the immense varie- 

 ties and quality of our fruits and pro- 

 ductions, Florida certainly must take a 

 back seat, and Eastern people are fast 

 finding out that it pays them to take the 

 long journey instead of the short one, 

 when they see or seek climate, scenery, 

 etc. I have seen hundreds of people 

 who have been in Florida, and all with- 

 out an exception give this State the 

 preference. 



On page 187 of the second volume of 

 "The New Revelation" (published by 

 T. J. Griffiths, Exchange Building, Utica, 

 N. Y.), a second son called "Christ" is 

 to be born, and God is to rear the child 

 in California, as there is the most perfect 

 air on the continent, and God designs to 

 bring him forward soon, as He has 



