The record-union., 1894-12-18
DUTY OF THE PRESS.
Make the People Happy and Contented
With Their Homes.
Happiness of More Real Value to Nam
kind Than Either Wealth
or Station.

s. S. Bovnton. of the Oroville Register,
to be read at the late session of the Cali
fornia Press Association:
The duty we owe to our State is not so
much to picture the salubrity of our
climate, the fertility of our soil, the
wealth of our fruit and grain, the
grandeur Of our mountains, the magnifi-
cence OF our forests, the loveliness of our
valleys ana the beauty and attractiveness
of our streams, as IL is to make the peo-
pie OF this State contented with their
homes. Contentment means happiness
and permanent improvements; it means
the oft-recurrlng il not constant praise OF
the regio where we dwell, and it means
the endeavor to increase our population
and our resources on the part OF all who
live here.
There is among US too much unrest. too
great desire for change, too little willing
ness TO live In one spot and to make that
spot, that home, the most lovely and the
most desirable on earth. The press can
do much 10 do away with this unrest and
to make us all contented with our homes,
and this is one of the many duties we
owe to California. This above all other
regions ought to be land OF homeS-of
homes that in beauty OF surroundings
and in matchless settings Of fruits ana
flowers will be unsurpassed in the world.
This State ought 10 contain millions OF
valleys. in her fruitful foothills, among
her auriterous mountains and along
the shores of her boundiess sea-homes
that we could point to with pride and ad-
miration, saying to the traveller, "1 ou
may boast OF your mills and factories, OF
your cotton and corn fields, your sugar
and rice plantations, your tobacco patches
and cranberry swamps, but we boast OF
our lovely and productive homes; homes
on which the sun shines brilliantly more
than 800 days in the year; homes about
which ice rarely forms and snow never
falls; homes around which bloom the
fruit and olive, fig and vine, the
almond, orange and date; homes
where rare and lovely flowers are per-
petually in bloom, and where the most
delicious fruits can be plucked from New
ears to the following Christmas. The
Frenchman may boast of his vines
and his wines, the Italian of
his orange groves and chestnut
forests, the Russian of his mammoth
fields OF grain, the Scotchman OF his gran
ite hills, the lrishman of his lovely lakes,
the Swiss OF his pinnacled snow-capped
mountains, yet the Californian cries: "ln
each and every one OF these my glorious
State excels you. L can point with pride
to mountains SURPRISING the Alps in
grandeur, to rivers eXcelling the Rhine
or the Danube in beauty, 10 wales sur
passing Cashmere In loneliness, and to
lakes more charming than Como or
Killarney: but California has something
beyond these, something higher and
of greater value-tor 1T Is land
of Incompatible, unapproachable, per-
feet homes Not palaces on one
hand and novels on the other. Not
wine and olives for the rich man and
black bread aud barley broth for the
poor. Not land where all the good and
fruitful things must be sold to pay rent
and the tax-gatherer. but State where
the poorest child may pluck oranges from
his fathers tree, and where the widow
and her little flock may pick from the tree
and vine the most delicious figs, the rich
est olives and the most luscious grapes
for their own use." We owe no higher
duty to our beloved Slate than to make
her people happy and contented with
their homes, for contentment means
happiness and happiness is of more real
value to mankind than either wealth or
station. These California homes should
be more than things of beauty, than
places of adornment, for they should be
fruitful, productive, prosperous homes.
Let the home acre contain the life sus-
tanning olive, the poor mans tree. Let 1t
grow the date, on which the Persian, the
Arab and the Egyptian almost live. Let
it have the orange for luxury as well as
beauty; the lemon for use as well as for
ornament; the fig, the vine, the loquat,
the guava, not simply for show but for
the best and richest food that man can
eat. All the best fruits of the temperate
and torrid zone are here, for here the cli-
mates of the two blend in one without
the rigors OF the former nor the enerv-
ating influences of the othel. We have
here all the advantages Of good govern
ment and modern civilization, have all
that science and literature combined can
give US, yet we enjoy the soft and lovely
climate OF many parts of the torrId zone,
md fln of n hn In
dies without being subject to the plaques
and disadvantages Of those regions. Cal
ifornia is favored above any other part
of our nation or the continent of Europe,
for the whole Atlantic Coast from Maine
TO the most southern point of Texas, or
all Europe from Finland to Greece, can
not grow greater variety of fine fruits
and lovely flowers than any one OF
twenty counties in our marvellous state.
The press owes many duties to our be-
loved land. but certainly no higher nor
truer one than to educate the people Of
this vast Commonw to our unrlvaled
and matchless advantages, TO our gram
deur and magnificence, and at the same
time to lmplant and foster within them
such love of their abodes as will make
California renowned for Its elegant, taste
ful and productive homes. Let US point
out the immense posSl ollltleS OF this
Western empire and show our unlimited
capacity for growing the tea OF China, the
date of Persia, the coffee of Central
America, the camphor of Japan, the
cherimoyer of South America and the
mango of Southern Asia. as well as hemp,
fiax, tobacco. rice, cochineal, ramie, jute
and a hundred other things that in time
will be taken from our number of I'M
ports and added to our list of exports.
Let us so impiant the love Of home in
the heart of every California child that it
will be to each a sacred spot, too sacred to
i lfk,
RothschildS.
In performing this duty there is room
for the highest skill and ability among
the keen and brilliant writers of this
State. The duty ought to be a loving one,
performed with no niggard heart or neg
1inant hand