TOUR OF GRANGEHS IN CALIFORNIA. 195 



in the schoolhouse should be spent in the study of plants in the 

 school garden. 



The motion that the subject be referred to the Committee on 

 Window Gardening was unanimously carried. 



The meeting was then dissolved. 



MEETING FOR DISCUSSION. 

 The Tour of the Grangers in California. 



By O. B. Hadwen, of Worcester. 



In speaking of my sojourn in the great State of California and 

 giving an account of its agricultural and horticultural resources 

 and interests, built up since the tide of emigration from the Eastern 

 States set towards the western slope of the Sierra Nevadas, I can 

 but declare that neither my time nor m}- opportunity is equal to 

 more than the merest superficial account of the great orchards 

 and vineyards extending from the Napa Valley of the north to 

 the San Diego and the San Gabriel of the south. 



As we near the foot-hills on the western slope of the Sierra 

 Nevadas the cultivation of the apple becomes manifest in small 

 but well cultivated orchards. As we approach the valley of the 

 Sacramento, orchards of the peach, pear, and plum, as well as 

 market gardens, are seen, apparently under the best management 

 and care. 



Perhaps no other given space has Nature signalized with so 

 great a variety of climate and products, as that of forty miles 

 from the mountain to the foot-hills and the valley, which challenges 

 the attention of all who have a fondness for her works. 



Having seen this most charming and wonderful feature of 

 landscape and cultivation, we arrive at the City of Sacramento 

 to find a banquet in readiness at the State Capitol for the 

 Grangers and their invited guests. Four hundred or more were 

 seated at the tables, which were most bountifully supplied with 

 the fruits, flowers, wines, and other products of the State, and no 

 State can entertain guests with more generous hospitalit}'. No 

 State can set a table more temptingly arranged, — loaded with 

 only the products of her own soil, than can California. Not only 

 may be found fish and fowl with all the domestic meats, and all of 

 the vegetables used in civilized communities, but the greatest 



