CHAPTER IV 



HISTORY AND DEVELOPMENT OF 

 AGRICULTURE IN CALIFORNIA 



As it is the purpose of this writing to characterize 

 the rural life of California as an American State and 

 to indicate agencies and influences which prevailed 

 in its development toward present conditions and 

 achievements, it would not be germane to pursue 

 affairs that made no contribution thereto even though 

 they are of great historical or ethnological interest. 

 One such question is the aboriginal population. It 

 is estimated that when California was entered for 

 settlement by the Spanish missionaries in 1769 there 

 Tiay have been a third of a million Indians, living in 

 groups comprising hundreds of self-governing tribes 

 speaking more than a hundred dialects, scattered 

 throughout the State. Although this density of abo- 

 riginal population gave California the leadership of 

 the states, for it has been estimated that "with one- 

 twentieth of the area of the United States California 

 held one-eighth of the native population of the whole 

 country," these strange people contributed to the 

 Spanish development only inducement and oppor- 

 tunity. The inducement was the saving of their 

 souls from paganism : the opportunity was wide open 



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