Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1872-07-16

/ t-tH
| No. 20 South Side Public Square
| ap16tillian3 70 cod 1stp
TIE ~PIKEs,' OF sOUTHERN CAL
l IFOREIA.
Effects of Railroads ana she Land.
1 Grant SYSTEM.
A correspondent of the New York Tri-
bune, writing from Visalia, Tulare County, in
/ southern California, says: l don't know
how the Mohammedans of Mecca would
act if railroad was within fifty miles of
their holy place, and approaching at the
rate of mile day; but they would regard
the engineers, I imagine, with something of
the safiie horror and aversion with which
these emissaries OF civilization are regarded
by about one third Of Visalia. For this town
has long been the Mecca Of the Pike. His
catte wandered over million ofaeres here
abouts; his win was Law; his vsqueros
were the ministers OF his win, and bis voice
was public opinion. And now comes he
| railroad, and-but must let the Pike speak
his own sentence: "Here you're bringing
| in this railroad, and that will briug a
crowd of small farmers; the Germans
| will rush in here soon; the whole darned
country will be fenced in before you
know if, and then it will be ruined
forever And having gone thus far, John
Pike opens his mouth little wider, and
lets out q mixture of profanity and
tobacco Juice, which presently leaves him
in possession Of the room. The railroad
is really a great civilizer. It not only
quiets the Indians; it drives off the Pixies.
They are selling out sheep and emigrating
by scores TO Arizona; and if you were
here now you might buy town lots and
farms at very moderate prices frerl men
who sdon't mean to live near no railroad
not if they know it." They showed me q
man down here who refused some years
ago to let the telegraph wires pass over his
farm. she didn't want the whole eountry
to know every time he whipped his chill
dren," be said. Aud when it was ex-
planned to him that the wires did not of
themselves, take cognizance of passing
events he replied ;-"Well anyhow, he'd
always hearn that it killed corn" There
are Pixies with property and Pixies without.
When he has farm, you may know it
by house, with a room on each side, and
a broad open passage in the middle; car
pets there are none, and If you go IN you
shall find that they cook by an open fire,
and that bacon and stringy green's and
corn pone are his fare. He may be worth
$4,000 or $4,000, but his dooryard is in
litter, and his women are bedraggled and
frOWsy, and his children greeneyed, horse
Jockey looking aud neglected, and his first
offer of hospitality is whiskey. He Is not
bad creature; profane be is, and rough, till
rough seems too mild word; but he is
hospitable after his way; and If yon are
not a s'pre-emptcr Of one hundred and sixty
acres,n he will treat you well.
Tten there is the Pike who owns no
land. Sometimes he is rich, too, for be has
cattle, and they feed by hundreds on Con-
gress land, with the rest. But oftenest
be is Door; he lives in q wagon. saw
a man who had been living in a wagon
for twenty years, and has raised family
in it. After the wagon tolls harmless
old COW, with three or four calves fol-
lowing it. sits wonderful how prolific
the cattle of these fellows are, even in a
dry season. said q man to me in Nisalia.
aWhy, I've seen one of them come in
to town with a single heifer that had at
leas four calves, all born in the same year"
This poor, John Pike has the knaek Of
tpro riating other peoples calves, and
Il rning them, as necessity demands, into
sugar, coffee, bacon and flour. Well, the
Pixies, poor and rich, are panic struck.
They are getting ready to leave the
country, before the railroad shall utterly
ruin it. And they are wise. Their en-
pire is gone. The small farmers are
not following the railroad; they precede |
il: and all over the great plain south Of
Visalia, and In the foothills, and even
down near the shores of the great Tu-
lare lake, you see little boxes of houses
standing far spart, the signs Of small far
mers who have here chosen each his 100 |
acres, and who will no longer be worried |
and buiIied by the cattle Owners. You
are TO understand that the great San
JOAQUIN valley, which contains about "a
600 s1uare miles, or about 15,360,U OO
acres, and is $50 miles, long, by from 20 to
40 miles wide, has been gwen up, over
since the Americans came into the eoun-
try, to cattle and horses. The farmers
have year after year encroached upon the
castle, 60 that now few cattle are found
north of MERGED; and as far south as the
San JOAQUIN river the farmers are dis
putting the land with cattle and antelopes,
and YOU nnay see herds of cows and an
-
sand acre field Of wheat.
But south of the San joaquin, cattle
have been until now supreme, and their
owners-who were not and are not owners
of the soil, but mere squatters-haye
assumed all the power and airs OF lords
oftbe country. They would have bought
mn the whole country before now were 1t
not reserved from the clutches of such
land rnonopolists. When the Southern |
Pacific Railroad charter was granted by |
Congress, that corporation received as
has ! been isdai, :, land grant !
of alternate sections for twenty miles on |
each side of its road. It is entitled to |
build two lines, if the map is to be trus- |
ted. one running from Gilroy, across the |
coast-rapge, to Visalia, and thence south |
ward by way of Bakersfield, to the |
Tahatchapl pass, and by way of San
Rernardiono to Fort Yuma; the other |
south and east of Tulare lake, through |
the Bakersfield country again, and by
way of the Tehatchapl pass to Fort
Mohane. Now, when Congress makes
land grand to q railroad, it reserves by a
custom which is of extreme Importance,
and which yet is little understood in the
east. all the even sections from sale, and
holds them exclusively for settlers under
fine homestead and presumption laws
Thus land monopoly is entirely prevented.
You may buy six HUNDRED and folty acres
from the railroad company; but you can
not buy siDglSacre from the government
nnless YOU settle on it and improve It Tor
a wear; and the country thus withheld
from general sale is, in fact, dedicated 70
the use of small farmers, for no man can
acquire greatrbody of land lying together
and no one man wants two or three alter
nate sections. Thus, the great, fertile
San joaquin valley is kept open by law
for homes for the homeless. 1t has still, as
nearly as l can as certain, without reck,
oniBg the foothills, about two millions and
a half acres of land, owned either by the
government or the railroad company-one
half by each; and upon the Congress land
any citizen has the right to settle, taxing
| so acres as q homestead for nothing, or loO
acres by pre-emption and actual settlement
at $3.50 per acre, The railroad sections
are sold also in so, 100, $40 or GAO acre
pieces, and the company gives actual set
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