444 CALIFORNIA FRUIT SOCIETIES. 



exploited the fruit business during some years with a wonder- 

 ful ardor and success. It became the fashion to own fruit 

 farms, and no family belongings were complete without one. 

 It was proven, as plainly as figures could prove anything, that 

 the ownership of a small fruit farm insured competence and 

 comfort after four years; it might be earlier, but that was not 

 promised, and tliere were some so cautious as to admit that 

 five or six years might elapse before really satisfactory net 

 incomes would be assured; but that was the limit, and during 

 the craze it was firmly believed by the majority of Californians 

 that a man or woman with no knowledge of horticulture 

 might safely purchase land at from $100 to $300 per acre, on 

 credit, and, by paying a few dollars per acre for a few years 

 for planting and cultivation, secure from his property an 

 income which, in a few years, would pay off the debt and 

 leave him comfortably provided for life. The result, of course, 

 was a rush of teachers, clerks, and others with fixed incomes, 

 to buy fruit farms on instalments. Ordinarily prudent mer- 

 chants invested on a larger scale; there was a great influx 

 from the east, especially into southern California, whose 

 orange groves — really very profitable for some years — were a 

 wonderful attraction to visitors from colder regions ; large 

 grain farms were subdivided into fruit plots, until in some 

 districts one could ride for miles amid a constant succession of 

 orchards; and the whole state was alive with prosperity and 

 hope. The great savings banks almost alone kept their heads, 

 and would lend no money on orchard property. 



It may be useful to devote a paragraph to show in detail 

 some of the errors in the calculations of inexperienced 

 orchardists. In the first place, the cultivation of orchards is 

 expensive. With no rain during the summer, the moisture 

 must be preserved in the ground by constant stirring. The 

 largest orchardists, employing unmarried help, who furnish 

 their own blankets, and often live in cabins with rude bunks 

 ranged one above another, like bertlis on shipboard, abun- 

 dantly fed, to be sure, but otherwise costing nothing for keep, 

 and employed and discharged according to the needs of the 

 work, were able to reduce costs of cultivation to a compara- 



