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to be submitted to the fumes of sulphur. The chest is j ust a box that will 

 take these trays in and close, with a little room for the sulphur to go up 

 the sides and ends. I believe in Santa Clara County they use trays six 

 and eight feet long, and run them in on cars to the sulphur house, then 

 close the doors at both ends; and when they have been in there sufficient 

 time they run them out again. All these things depend upon the quan- 

 tity of fruit you have to dry. Another thing we haven't said a word about 

 drying, and that is grapes, such as you ordinarily sell for wine. In the 

 Livermore Valley and other localities, the grape growers, rather than sell 

 to the wine makers at the low prices, have dried their grapes. This year 

 the prices varied, starting as low as 2-J cents in California, and run up to 

 3-J. The bunches can be picked and laid on the ground and when dry 

 taken up into boxes, and then rinsed in boiling hot water; that removes the 

 dust and any insect's eggs that may have been deposited, and then laid 



A Delegate: Wouldn't that take the bloom off? 



Mr. Hatch: No, only to a very limited extent. There is becoming quite 

 a market for that fruit in the Eastern States; they use it for cooking mostly, 

 instead of the cheap raisins and Zante currants, to which, as a rule, they 

 are preferred; for Zante currants, as a general thing, are very dirty, and 

 where they want to use some fruit in cooking they get a better article for 

 their money, and these are much cheaper. In Europe they use them in 

 large quantities for making wine; we have not got to shipping yet to Europe 

 that I know of ; there they use most of them to make wine of. The finest 

 sample of dried fruit that I have seen this year, is made by Mr. J. L. Mosher 

 — I think he is in Santa Clara County — said to be by a new process in 

 some respects. It looked almost too good to eat. His plan I don't know. 

 I hope it will be submitted to us at some time. Now in regard to the 

 labor of fruit drying. Two years ago we thought there was nobody in 

 the world that would cut fruit or dry it except Chinamen. In the last 

 year or two there has been quite a change in that direction. In the 

 Vaca Valley one day during this last season, a man who was largely 

 engaged in fruit culture there told me "the labor problem is solved, for 

 we can get white help, and the best kind of white help there is in any 

 county — the women, the girls, and the boys." I do not speak now of boys, 

 such as would be picked up in a city by hundreds, or any small quantity — 

 there you can go and pick them out by one or two — for if you get a gang of 

 boys from any city or large town together they have too much fun to do 

 good work, but women, young ladies, and children, by just letting it be 

 known that this kind of help was wanted, and they could get all they 

 wanted. One of them would do the work of two Chinamen, getting twice 

 the price, of course; that is right; do it by contract, so much for one hun- 

 dred pounds, and it is remarkable how much good work some of those 

 children will do. On my place this year, some young ladies, when they 

 got their $2 worth of work done would quit and go home, but there was one 

 little boy ten years old that worked there through the season; his average 

 was a little rising of forty boxes — he got 20 cents a hundred — his largest 

 work was fifty of those boxes, for which he received 20 cents a hundred, 

 being something over $3 a day, and did it as well as any. We have but 

 one other on the place, twenty-three years old, who did one day sixty of 

 those boxes, or one ton of peaches, cut them, and put them on the table to 

 dry. We have not now to go to the Chinese to do any of that kind of work; 

 it is work that can be done neatly; they need not become dirty; their hands, 

 of course, will become stained with the fruit, but you have a bucket of clean 

 water for them to wash in, and it is wonderful how nice and neat those 



