Elizabeth daily monitor. [volume] (Elizabeth, N.J.) 1868-1880, 1873-10-24
THE MATERIAL PROGRESS OF CALF Or
MIA

The progress of California in material
enterprises is something quite wonder
full and startling. A year brings about
changes for which one can hardly look
in ten years. 1t is but eighteen months
ago that the idea of system Of irriga-
ton, to include the whole of the San
Joaquin Valley, was preached, and then
the most sanguine OF the projectors
thought that to give their enterprise a
fair start would require years, and a
great number of shrewd men believed
the whole scheme visionary. But few
experiments showed to land owners and
capitalists the enormous advantages of
irrigation, and now this scheme has suf-
ficient capital behind it, and large land.
holders are offering subsidies and mort
gaging their lands to raise means to
hasten completion of the canal. Two
years ago the reclamation OF the tule
lands, though begun, advanced slowly,
and arguments were required to con-
vince men that tule land was safe in
yestment. But this year eight hundred
miles of levee will be completed, and
thousands of acres will bear wheat next
harvest which were overfiowed eighteen
months ago. Two years ago the ques-
ton whether California could produce
good raisins could not be answered !;
but last fall raisins which sold in the
San Francisco market beside the best
Malagas were cured by several persons,
aud it is now certain that this State can
produce-and from its poorest side-hill
lands-raisins enough to supply the
whole Union. Not year passes but
some new and valuable product OF the
soil is naturalized in this State; and
one who has. seen the soil and who
knows the climate of the two great val
leys, who sees that within five, or, at
most, ten years all their overfiowed
lands will be diked and reclaimed, and
all their dry lands will be irrigated. and
who has, besides, seen how wide is the
range of products which the soil and
climate yield, comes at last to have what
seems to most Eastern people an ex-
aggerated view of the future of Califor-
MIA.
But, in truth, it is not easy to exag-
gerate, for the soil in the great valleys
is deep,and of extraordinary fertility !;
there are no forests to clear away, and
farms lie ready-made to the settlers
hands the range of products includes
all those of the temperate zone and
many of the torrid the climate is in
MIGRATING and predisposes to labor /;
and the seasons are extraordinary
favorable to the labors of the farmer
and gardener. The people have not
yet settled down to hard work. There
are SO many chances in life out there
men become overenterprising-a specu-
lative spirit invades even the farm
house and as man can always live
food being SO abundant and the climate
so kindly-and as the population is as
yet sparse, men are tempted to go from
one avocation to another, to do many
things superfcially, and to look for sud-
den fortunes by the chances of shrewd
venture, rather than be content to live
by patient and continued labor. This,
however, is the condition of all new
countries ; it will pass away as popula-
ton becomes more dense. And, mean.
time, California has gifts of nature
which form solid substratum upon
which will, in a few years, be built up
a community productive far beyond the
average of wealthy or productive COM
munities. This is my conclusion after
seeing all parts of this State more in de-
tail than perhaps any one man has
taken the trouble to examine it Har-
per's Magazine.