1888 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



977 



not seen a fly of any kind about the horses, 

 and I am told flies rarely trouble them at 

 any season. I have made some garden for 

 my elder brother, on the mountain, and yes- 

 terday we plowed for my younger brother 

 one-fifth of an acre for strawberries, but we 

 couldn't get any plants until to-day, and 

 now it rains. Before the rain, however, I 

 planted lettuce, radishes, and beets. I know 

 they will grow, for barley is springing up 

 everywhere. It is strange, how thoroughly 

 barley is seeded all over the country. It is 

 almost the only thing they use for hay; and, 

 even thoiigh cut green, the grain is ripe 

 enough to germinate. The seed rattles out 

 of the loads of hay, grows quickly as a weed, 

 bears enormous crops, often 100 kernels to 

 the head; in turn this seeds the land, and so 

 on. Horses and cattle nibble it with avidity 

 when only an inch high, and so it is of im- 

 mense value on the pasture lots. 



Nov. S4.— To-day my brother mentioned 

 that a good meal, including coffee, could be 

 had in San Diego for only 15 cts. I was so 

 slow to believe it that we sallied out, just be- 

 fore dinner time, to test it. He called for a 

 couple of ribs of beef, Spanish. They 

 brought each of us a rib of beef, with more 

 meat on it than a hmigry man could eat, on 

 a large oblong plate. In fact, I should call 

 it a good plate of meat for a small family. 

 Well, with this was a large dish of mashed 

 potatoes, another of spinach, and more 

 bread and butter than we could both eat. 

 The beef was roasted with tomatoes and 

 red pepper, stewed down. Now, the entire 

 charge for the beef, tomatoes, potato, spin- 

 ach, bread and butter (nice butter too), was 

 only ten cents. We got this at the Dairy 

 restaurant ; and when I declared that it 

 could not be furnished so as to pay, brother 

 assured me he had had meals there for over 

 two weeks, and they were just as good and 

 just as cheap, right along. He says other 

 restaurants have the same bill of fare, and 

 make it pay. The Dairy feeds perhaps 500 

 people a day. Contrast the above with 75 

 cts. a meal, will you V The dairy gave us a 

 neat table, and the waiters are all white 

 people, neither negroes nor Chinese. After 

 dinner we visited the great Del Coronado 

 Hotel, that covers 7i acres, and is said to be 

 the largest hotel in the world. It is a mag- 

 nificent and .wonderful edifice, but I was 

 more pleased with the beautiful walks, 

 lawns, and flowers surrounding it than with 

 the building itself. Tlie guide-books of 

 travel have much to say in regard to the 

 wonderful and magnificent hotels of Califor- 

 nia; but when I learn that it costs S3.00 oi- 

 $4.00 a day to live at such places, the very 

 sight of them is painful to me. I shall al- 

 ways feel guilty, no matter how rich I am, 

 to pay as much for my board and lodgings 

 as two or three average day laborers can 

 earn. I can take off my hat, in token of 

 reverence and respect, to the company of 

 men who built the Sweet Water dam or the 

 40-mile San Diego flume. I am proud of 

 humanity when I contemplate their work; 

 but I have no such feeling when I view the 

 great hotels. 



On one- side of the Coronado House the 

 yyijd waves of old ocean were roaring and 



pounding; and if they always roar and 

 splash and foam as they did to-day, I never 

 knew it, that is all. 



To Hriber.— After papa saw the great 

 waves of the Pacific Ocean tumble and roll, 

 almost as high as the housetops, he visited 

 the ostrich farm, where a dozen great birds 

 were penned up in a field. They were tall 

 enough to eat from the eaves of a tolerable 

 house, and they can kick with their heels al- 

 most as hard as a horse. They can beat any 

 horse running; and when they snap their 

 jaws at a beet or carrot, you feel pretty glad 

 that they are over the fence, where they 

 can't get you. One of the young ones was 

 in a pen, sick ; the others had kicked him 

 and made him lame. Their eggs are as 

 large as a small pumpkin, and if takes six 

 weeks to hatch them. The heu bird lays 

 about 20 eggs, and then both birds take 

 turns sitting on them. An ostricli is worth 

 more than a good horse. One nice feather 

 from an ostrich is worth from $2.00 to $5.00. 

 The keeper went in tiie flock with a great 

 pole and " shooed "' them as he would a lot 

 of turkeys. The young ones all ran before 

 him ; but the old papa ostrich turned after 

 him with a kind of bellowing noise and made 

 him run, I tell you. After he had chased 

 him out of the lield he whiiled and kicked 

 at him as spiteful as you ever saw Meg kick. 

 He will fight as spunky as a Bantam roos- 

 ter, even if he is taller than a horse, and has 

 legs and feet almost as heavy. 



Nov. 20.— To my Sunday-scJiool class. IJoys, 

 when you are away from home be sure that, 

 before Sunday comes, you have found a 

 place to go to church, and don't fail to be up 

 and ready for all the Sabbath services. My 

 brother has been located in this neighboi- 

 hood a couple of weeks, but they had not 

 yet got around to looking up the places of 

 worship. On Saturday evening it occurred 

 to me we had not yet attended to the mat- 

 ter, so I started out with Roy, a bright boy 

 of 14, who said he knew pretty nearly where 

 the church was. When in the vicinity I 

 stepped into a store, where I had done some 

 trading, to make inquiries. This store had 

 a more respectable appearance than its 

 neighbors, and no liquors or tobacco was 

 prominently paraded. The proprietor was 

 a Christian, sure enough, and at once intro- 

 duced me to several of his customers and 

 neighbors. In a few moments one of them 

 had voliniteered to go with us if we would 

 call round at 10 o'clock next morning. We 

 were on hand, and on the way we passed 

 some groceries, stores, and meat-markets, 

 that were open on Sunday. How different- 

 ly the owners looked, mn\ their places of 

 business, from the church-goers I They 

 were dirty, untidy, and unhappy looking. 

 Those who had closed their stores looked 

 bright, clean, and happy, and their places of 

 business, neatly closed up (for they had 

 been made tidy the night befoie), showed in 

 sharp contr.ist to the others. 'I'herc are 

 some who say there is no Sinuiayiherf' in 

 Calif(uni;i : but 1 am glad to be able to say 

 it isn't so. On the diurcli steps we met the 

 pastor. I{ev. F. 15. Perkins, formerly of 

 Massachusetts, and he gave us a warm wel- 

 come, and took my brother's address, that 



