New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1869-07-19

Great Expectations She discounted the future In
7estments in real estate have diverted so much capt.
tai from its usual channels that hears complaints
| OF hard times and scarcity of money. A San Fran
cisco building site. which sold last March for $4,000
now commands $4,000 The best business lots
along Montgomery and CalifOrnia-sts.-are 1877 feet
deep, aud range in value from 900 to s. 900 god
per front foot. Wild lands in remote counties can
still be bought for 81 and q per acre ;
nearer markets, they command from S to $1O
Ranches There are no farms in Californa-every-
thing is ranch) half mile outside the City of Sac
ramentO and three miles from the river sell for 500
an acre. In one of the best districts, ten or fifteen
miles south of San Francisco d. 0. Mills has an es-
tate of 1900 acres. Though it is not distinctively
dairy farm he keeps 400 mich COWS. A railway
track for taking his products to market into his
barn. The large, highly improved ranches in that
region are held at from $3.50 to $500 per acre. Farming
in California has been wonderfully lucrative. Hun
dreds of thousands of acres are rated of figures
which would brighten an Eastern man, but upon
which woOlgrowing alone has returned clear profit
of three per cent month for several years. The
same is measuraby true of other agricultural in
terests.
Small farms grow in favor but the old Spanish
system has left many large land holders. To bettle
immense tracts is general affectaton, an odd out
cropping of local humOr. The Californian invites an
Eastern visitor: "COme down to San Mataeo and
spend week with me-" Have you ranch there ~
Eyes O little place." "What do you call a little
placep well 10000 acres'-or 10000, OF 10000, as
the case may be- Everybody seems to have little
place. The other evening met Gen. Beale known
as an old army officer, who led one of the Govern
ment explorations for Pacific Railroad He resides in
the South, below Los Angeles though his Summer
home is in Philadelphia. "Have you little place.
toop 1 asked. Eyes, 225,OOO acres on my home
ranch, and 5000 more in Northern Californian
That home ranch" if it were square tract, would
be 10 miles across 1t is one-third as large as the
State of Rhode Island. There are other men who
own 100000 acres apiece Beale dispenses something
of old Baronial hospitality. Every wayfarer is well
coined to table and bed without money and without
price. Some nights. 30 travellers are there enter
tanned
There was prevalent impression that the moment
the last rail was laid immigrants and spectators
with pockets full of money would pour into Cali
fornia to buy land. As yet, no such movement has
begun and disappointment is felt. STILL though city
lots improved farms and wild lands have advanced
from one hundred 10 fire hundred per cent within the
last two years. the values hold their own firmly
And people cannot be very hard up" whose
smallest coin is ten cents, and who count that as
twelve and half to save inconvenience IN making
change The silver dime mere taxes tne olu couIn-
ern and Western name of the bit and the value of
the ancient ninepence" Of New-England and shil-
ling OF New-York. Eight bits pass for dollar The
morning newspaper costs bit; nothing sells for
less no smaller coin is ever seen; change is very
loosely computed. Competition has reduced the
cost of telegraphing between Sacramento and San
Francisco from 1.-TWO bits to fifteen cents In send
ing dispatches from the Sacramento office, when l
gave the clerk two dimes he kept them both without
comment; when gave him only one he made no
complaint.
The hostess. ut q house where dned the other
day, came TO California when mere child. She
remembers absolutely nothing of her old home
do you really use pennies in the States r she
asked "Yesn "They made of copper, are they
not ~ Eyes" Have you any greenbacks with
youi / never saw but one, and have forgotten
how that looked" i succeeded in fishing up from
the bottom of u pocket one crumpled twenty-five
cent note Of postal currency. She turned it over
and over with keen curiosity. ut seems very
strange to me that this should be money! she said.
1t don't look like money" What does 1t look
likefD well (hesitatingly, and with the utmost
sincerity "it-looksliko-G label for oyster can"
n