THE FRUIT OUTLOOK 



59 



countries. The fact is that European countries can not grow fruit 

 enough to supply their own people and fruit has been largely a 

 luxury. California dried fruits are being welcomed by the great 

 middle classes and are likely to become a staple of their diet. This 

 explains the ultimate disposition of the large amounts now going 

 direct from California to Europe. 



California's exports of high-class food supplies to European 

 countries are likely to reach values like those of the wheat and 

 barley which we are now sending to that part of the world. The 

 development of adjacent territory on the American continent and 

 other Pacific countries may shape the future of California as a fruit 

 producing State in a way which can at present only be dreamed 

 about. It should be remembered that California has a unique char- 

 acter from a horticultural point of view. Not only does the State 

 have a monopoly of semi-tropical conditions of the United States 

 (excepting small parts of the Gulf States and Arizona), but Cali- 

 fornia has command of the whole of northwest America and the 

 whole of northeast Asia, not only in the supply of semi-tropical 

 fruits, but in early ripening of hardy fruits as well. 



California does not grow tropical fruits, as has already been 

 conceded in Chapter I. They must come from the islands and the 

 tropical south coast countries. Semi-tropical fruits are/ however, 

 vastly more important in commerce than tropical, and a region 

 which successfully combines northern orchard fruits with the whole 

 semi-tropical class commands the fruit trade of all accessible popu- 

 lous regions which have limited fruit capabilities. There are now 

 four such regions with the kind of population which makes for 

 industrial advancement Southern Europe, South Africa, parts of 

 Australia and California. As already shown, we are competing 

 successfully with South Europe in the capacious markets of North 

 Europe. South Africa and Australia are unfortunate in lying in 

 the southern hemisphere, which is mostly ocean wastes, and they 

 are handicapped by tropic crossing in their northern shipments, 

 although the fact of opposite seasons may help them, and also us, 

 in avoiding competition of trade which both desire. California will 

 soon be less than half as far sea from European and Atlantic coast 

 ports as at present, but California in the future will have less 

 occasion for such distant recourses. Prophets, far-seeing in world 

 courses, declare that the Pacific ocean is to be the arena for com- 

 merce greater than the world has yet seen, and the Pacific coast 

 countries are to contain the greater part of the world's population. 

 This greatest quartosphere with its superlative opportunities and 

 activities will have California as its treasure house of fruits and 

 fruit products. During the long winter the citrus fruits will afford 

 tonic and refreshment, and before hardy fruits bloom in northern 

 climes the same fruits will appear from the early ripening districts 

 of California. In this traffic California will not only be practically 



