184 RESOURCES OF CALIFORNIA. 



are backward. The chief working force of the world is now 

 steam, and the State which relies mainly on its human muscle, 

 as California does, is at a great disadvantage. We not only 

 lose the profit on the steam-engines, and that on the 

 wages of the skilled operatives, but we condemn ourselves 

 to the production of raw material the most unprofitable of 

 all occupations pay freight on raw material to Atlantic ports, 

 and on the manufactured articles back, deprive our land-own- 

 ers of the rent of factories and dwellings for factory laborers, 

 and leave our farmers without a home market. We send our 

 wool, hides, leather, bones, horns, and mustard to distant 

 countries, and receive one-third of them in a manufactured 

 condition another third going to pay the manufacturers, 

 middlemen, and shippers. 



Prominent among the obstacles to the development of our 

 own manufactures, -is the lack of cheap coal, iron, and hard 

 wood. The western slope of the continent does not, so far as 

 known, produce any first-rate mineral coal, which is the basis 

 of mechanical power. Such coal as we have in California is 

 not abundant, nor is its extraction very cheap. Iron ore of 

 excellent quality we have, but dear transportation and dear 

 coal prevent the erection of furnaces, and we import all our 

 iron from Atlantic ports. Tough hard wood (such as oak, 

 ash, and hickory, fit for wagons, cars, agricultural implements, 

 and strong casks) is imported from the Eastern States. The 

 unsettled state of society, the insecurity of land titles, and the 

 frequency of land suits, tend to repel capital and keep up the 

 rates of interest, which are so high that manufacturers cannot 

 afford to pay the current rates. Yet, if large manufacturing 

 establishments offered an unexceptionable security, they could 

 probably borrow at the rates slightly in advance of those cur- 

 rent in England. 



135. Statistics. According to the Federal census, Califor- 

 nia had, in 1870,3,984 manufacturing establishments, employ- 

 ing 25,392 persons and $40,000,000 capital, paying out $13,- 



