8 FRUIT-GROWING 



them they could figure out an independent in- 

 come after the trees were five or six years old 

 and with an increasing income every year after 

 that. The methods of some of these companies 

 were outrageous in the extreme. I know of one 

 case where the planters repeatedly sold the 

 same tract to one buyer after another. It was 

 the best ten-acre block in their whole develop- 

 ment scheme and was so attractive that every 

 "prospect" wanted it for his own. Each 

 thought that he had bought it until he visited 

 the place years after and found that "through 

 an error" he owned quite a different block of 

 orchard. 



Few, if any, of these tract propositions ever 

 came anywhere near fulfilling the promises of 

 the promoter's literature. Most of them were 

 failures from the start and a few never got 

 beyond the paper stage. 



About ten years ago a company was formed 

 to start one of these tract orchards near where 

 I now live. At that time I was living in the 

 city. I secured a copy of the prospectus, which 

 I still have, and investigated the concern, not 

 with any idea of investing, but because ' ' Cherry 

 Heights" was near the place where I expected 

 to live. 



It was a beautifully finished booklet. It 

 would make almost any one want to own a 

 "tract" just to read its pages and to look at 



