Mineral Point weekly tribune. (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1859-1868, 1863-11-11
The traits of California; Glowing Deseaip-
From San francisco Letter dated Sept. 2sth, in
the New York Evening POST
STRAWBERRIES


STRAWBERRIES.
Think-if YOU can think without breaking
the Tenth commandments your CORES
pondent, even at this hour, long past mid
September, making his daily lunch of straw
berries as fresh, as dewy-sweet almost as
plentiful as they were in Fulton market in
June When | tell YOU that shall rise from
this desk to eat your health in plate of
lucious seedlings, holding nearly qua: :, |
speak the simple truth. For the climate and
science have made the strawberry in Cali
fornia a perennial bearer. In February it
begins to appear in the markets 1t is in
high abundance from April to September. It
is always pFocurabie until December, and
special arrangements with the gardner will
get it furnished you through that month and
January, the scarcest of the year.
OTHER FRUITS.
Nor is the strawberry sole mistress Of the
situation in this perennial chaI8c teristic
A sight of the glorious fruity anachronism-
the reconciled incongruities which cluster in
that seasonIeSs, time-detying hall of immortal
luxuries, a San Francisco market-staI-would
drive vegetarian mad with ecstacy, and
make an eastern man declare with DR.. Tribu-
lation Cummings that the unbroken summer
of the millennium was close at hand Come
with me into cool alcove of the Washington
market, not FIVE minutes walk from a desk in
the Golden Era office, where | now sit writ
ing and if your sensuOus maginatOn can
bear the Barmecide feast which il will
alas be to you, on your side Of the CONT
nent, run over with me the catalogue of fruits
which we may find for sale there, all at once,
and clear into the days of autumn.
Here are the strawberries of which have
sung rather than prosed, each large enough
TO demand two bites and separate epithala-
f,-i ~
delicate as if it were the little field fruit Of
the east 1.-THE strawberry CT California IS the
only one of its vegetables which preserves
this delicacy through all the Sizes by their
side the California blachberries out Law ton
Lawton, both in magnitude and iuiciness ::
huckleberries blue, black and dewy-white,
heap their purple blooded spherules in vast
hills near by; here raspberries of ali the
coIors which heaven makes them, all the fla
vors, from that of the delicious Antwerp Sy-
barite, Iounging on delicate espaliers in sunny
gardens, TO the fresh, original aroma of the
little black-helmetted savage who used to
scratch our attacking hands on Saturday af-
tern0Ons of boyhOod and summer. Here are
giant goosbeIries, each possible tart, all save
the pastry; currants, white, red, black and
golden, juicier and larger than the average
gOosberry Of the east; wild cherries, of sew
eral varieties; plums of every possible kind.
No anachronism is 90 striking for this con
yeution Of Pomona children. As the eter-
nal kingdom Of souls shall bring together in
sweet conclave -Eschylus, Shakespeare, Pin
dar Walter the Minnesnger, Mrs. Browning,
Hafz and James Russell Lowell, nor shall
either ask the other, "Of what age are you -
Where were you when | was singing in old
times . so the fruits in this sunny alI-time,
vet o-partICulaT- time, of San Francisco have
utterly forgotten that in other portions Of the
globe the despot Of the seasons bars them
from each others company and ushers them
INTO mems banquets only over each others
new-made graves.
So, in this anachronistic heaven of the
fruits, the gorgeous rare-ripe and malacatoOu
peach smile across the berries / have re-
hcarsed at the Bartlett, the Beurre dArem-
bourg, the puchesse dAngouleme, the Seckel
and the Virgalieu pears. Every variety Of
apple, from the herald Bow to the hle-closing
russell, mingling its fragrance with the musk
and citron OdOrs of innumerably -yaried mel
ons, and the cool scent Of the green-Skinnei
giant who always carries suggestions Of
Tiyoi or plashy fountain perennial within
him, ana Is prc-nOminated water for that
reason. Oh, the figs that pile their geld and
purple thuribles close by! needing no priest
to swing them that their honeyed scent may
Hoat everywhere under the arches, ana bring
N to worship the eager bees-the no less
eager boys who love them as well. When |
think how worthy of being loved is plump,
fresh tig, | feel a sort of honest pride in the
memory that there was never a time when |
did not love them, either an nat,lrd or iced,
sliced and eaten at dewey morning tide for
breakfast with cream and sugar. l am so
glad that fresh figs were no mere acquired
taste with me, as they are with some people
| can't understand that Next to the FIGS
sF4sH bundles Of delicious
cane from the Sandwich Islands, whereof l
learned TO eat by the linear rod.
GRAPES.
While on the subject of foreign fruits. let
me not forget that | have seen here, during
this very month, gin company with al the
above mentioned, bananas and pineapples
from Acapulco, cocoauuts, ead-fruit, man
goes, lines and oranges from Honolulu. But
the luxury OF protusiOn reaches its acme only
in the grapes Anywhere on kearney, or
Sansome, or Montgomery street-anywhere
in the Washington or Pacific markets-Bac-
chus ight turn around to take the lite-lease
Of lounge, crying . W plus ultra" Here,
each several berry, large "a an eastern green
gage, he glorious ohrysoprase, lunches Of the
spicy MuScat hang almost bursting with the
weighty consciousness of their generous liquor,
and the sunshine sits through the translucent
globes of the Open-aIr-trained Hamburgs,
coming out amethystine on the hither side
In the vineyards and the markets of Califor-
MIA are ovcr one hundred and sjrtV rel defined
and separate uaTictes Of grapes How then
shall We DO justice to a fruit like this by sim
ply calling names-saying Sweet-water,"
: Los Angeles . Chasselas"-, and coming
later, though long before the. strawberries
depart, our own transpIanted eastern darlings,
the "Isabellas," "Catawbas" and Della
wares" Since l have become convinced that
California Is yet to be the vineyard, pr excel
ieaes, Of all the world, l tasted the other
day, down ct Fosters charming house, Point
Lobos, tone gate-post of the Golden Gate,)
native champagne which was nearer that d.
vine concentration Of why essence, the no
SsHe NLscateaie-yes, even TO that ETHEREAL
hint of orange-fowers left by its bouquet on
your extreme pa!ate-tip-than any one wine
in my memory is like another, beside these
Harazsthy, the great Hungarian grape grower,
Is now at the head of a vineyard belonging to
the Bu,na Vista Ninicultural Society, which
in ten years will rival JohannisberC.
l viii not linger IN the fruity aIcoves to
tantalizc your now autumn beleaguered pal
ates with more than the names of apricots,
uectarines, damsons and cages. Nor viii l
bewilder you by dilating upon the great piles
OF grosser vegetable Injuries, the summer
squashes, cucumbers, tomatoes, elephants,