The San Francisco call., 1895-05-23
WHEN OTHER RESOURCES FAIL.

few months ago printer in Oakland
lost his position and could not secure an
other. He was cripple and had small
family and was poor. He disappeared for
few weeks, and when seen again on the
streets he had a basket on his arm and
was selling eggs. He had gone into the
foothills back of Berkeley, and by the
exercise of tact and ingenuity had got
possession OF little land and had put
some kind of house on it, had got few
chickens, and now he is happier and more
prosperous than ever he was in the dreary
years when he worked at the case"
1t is not given to all men to have this
sort of pluck, but the most discouraging
question that an unemployed city artisan
or laborer asks when advised to go into the
country and make home is, Glow is that
possible when | haven't a cent?" 1t is
wonderful what things are possible when
men are determined to accomplish them.
We have in mind penniless German
with wife and some young children.
They were dropped from the train at a
town in the San Joaquin Valley, practically
penniless. The man had all the sturdiness
and courage of his race. He was too wise
to stop in the town, but tramped away
across the plains, he and his family bear
ing all their worldly goods upon their
backs. OF course they were given shelter
and food that night, and of course they
paid for it in honest labor. By patient
pIodding he found a man who would sell
him some land, agreeing to accept part
of the annual crop as payment from year
to year. He had no house, no horse, no
COW, no pigs, no chickens, no furniture
hardly anything with which to begin the
struggle.
But the spirit of a man was in him. Peo-
pie lived there about, and there were many
things which he and his wife could do for
them. The house was built of odds and
ends that were worked for or received as
gifts. 1t was a poor cabin indeed, but
home for all that, and bland climate
makes poor house comfortable. A horse,
a COW, pigs and chickens came in time by
hard work, thrift, frugality, tact and all
the other good things that go to make a
successful man. He worked for the neigh
bors, and preferred almost anything above
money-an old chair, which he needed; a
discarded plow, which would serve him at
home for the present; chicken, which
would lay eggs and multiply after its kind !;
food of any sort that was to spare. Ten
years afterward this poor German was out
of debt, lived in good house and had a
happy, well-clad and well-schooled family
Nor had the wife been dragged down and
made hard and old and ugly. She had
been wise in handling Ter strength, and
her calm blue eyes and rosy cheeks told
the story OF how hope for better days
had sustained her.
1t is wonderful what pluck will do for
the poor man in the fertile fields of Cali
fornia. Almost everything that he may
need for food he may proddce on his little
farm; and as for clothing, that does not
cost much in the country. We have known
Italians, many of them, to get start in
this wise: They would find a man who
had just planted an orchard, and who ex-
pected to bear the expense of its cultiva-
ton for three, four or five years. when it
would come into bearing and then pay its
own way. They would offer to cultivate
and prune the orchard for say five years,
their only payment being the privilege of
raising annual crops-such as peas, beans
or what not-between the rows. This
would be advantageous to the owner, for
the young trees would not be hurt by
the annual crop. The Italians meanwhile
were growing on the soil what they needed
for food, and were selling the remainder
for cash profit.
1t is in the development of the art of
small farming that the best prosperity of
our people is to be found. They can always
produce sufficient to sustain life in com
fort, and most of the things which are con-
sumed; and it must be extraordinarily bad
management that does not permit of sur
plus. The life is not hard. There is no
biting cold weather to harass and depress.
And there is always something that the
wife and daughters can be raising to make
some money for themselves. Farming in
California on small scale presents per-
feet picture of completeness and comfort.