ITS CULTURE IN CALIFORNIA. 



3 



The dry season of 187G-7 came on, fol- 

 lowed by the wave of hard times which 

 swept across the country. People who 

 had planted on insufficient capital were 

 the first to feel the pressure. Many were 

 obliged to surrender their places. Joint- 

 stock nursery projects failed. Some nur- 

 serymen sold out, or were closed out, and 

 left the country. Thus the furor of orange 

 planting received a check. Nursery stock 

 being of slow sale, began to fall under 

 the operation of the law of the survival of 

 the fittest. Most of the orange orchards 

 already planted were too valuable to be 

 abandoned, no matter what the fate of the 

 planter might be, so somebody stepped in 

 to carry them forward. Thus it was that, 

 through all the times of depression and 

 discouragement, the industry itself went 

 steadily and surely forward. The un- 

 precedented frosts which occurred in the 

 winter of 1879-80, gave a rude awakening 

 to some people who planted in low, cold 

 places. Not only was the nursery stock 

 frosted to the ground, but in many in- 

 stances five and six-year-old trees were 

 destroyed. The devastation among lem- 

 ons and limes was even greater than 

 among oranges. These frosts demon- 

 strated that there were certain localities 

 in this country'- not at all adapted to orange 

 culture. Some people, a little more fortu- 

 nate in their locations, managed to weath- 

 er through the cold year, and even two or 

 three cold years afterwards, but for them 

 there still remained a rude awakening 

 when they found that their trees, having 

 reached the bearing age, were capable of 

 producing only an inferior quality of fruit. 



The season of 1882-3 was the most de- 

 pressing for the orange industry that we 



have ever known. The trees set unusu- 

 ally full, and this alone had a tendency to 

 dwarf the fruit and detract frotn its good 

 qualities. Then there were late frosts so 

 severe that some of the fruit was nipped, 

 and its juices injured or totally destroyed. 

 When the market opened the weather 

 was cold and rainy, and people were in no 

 mood for eating sour fruit. Prices went 

 down. Some producers and dealers who 

 shipped inferior oranges, in spite of the 

 unfavorable outlook, found that they had 

 their trouble for their pains and a freight 

 bill to settle besides. Then it was that 

 some superficial people began to inquire, 

 "Will orange growing pay?" "Haven't 

 we been deluded all this time in thinking 

 it a remunerative industry?" 



Those who got started right; who plant- 

 ed on high, warm, mellow soils; who took 

 good care of their trees, and followed 

 orange growing as an industry, not a 

 speculation, are the ones who suffered no 

 loss through the time of depression, and 

 who are now firmly grounded in the belief 

 that orange growing pays. Last season 

 while the average oranges of the lower 

 valley were going at a dollar a box, and a 

 slow sale at that; while many trees hung 

 full of little fruit, not salable at any price, 

 I talked with an orange grower of Pasa- 

 dena, who was sending off his large, 

 luscious Washington or Riverside Navels, 

 and realizing therefor $3.50 to $4 a box,— 

 "And if I had a hundred thousand boxes," 

 he said, "T could sell every one of them 

 at these prices. Will orange growing 

 pay? W^ell, I rather think it will. It is 

 to-day the best enterprise a man can en- 

 gage in." 



CHAPTER. IIL 



ANTIQUITY OF THE CITRUS FAMILY. 



Over fifty years ago Gallesio wrote, in are only to be found in treasured collec- 



French, a learned work on "Citrus Cul- tions. From this work I am able to glean 



ture," which, in more recent times, the some curious facts, as well as some very 



Horticultural Society of Florida translated ingenious and erudite surmises about the 



and published in English. Both original earliest record of the citrus family, 



and translation are now out of print, and Galleseo holds that the lemon and or- 



