The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1905-12-24
BY
Walter Clifford Smith


the fortunate man could sit under his
own vine and fig tree. He may do 50
now in California. The early and tn
latter rains are features of Holy Land
meteorology and are quite as familiar
on this ground. That suggestive text,
The harvest is ended and the summer
is past implies that the gathering OF
cereal crops preceded the end of the
heated term in Palestine, just as it
does in the San Joaquin and Santa
Margarita valleys. The parable of the
sower who cast his wheat upon good
soil and also upon rocks and thorns
might be born again out of the con-
ditions of our own agricultural life, 70"
who has not seen the California ranch
man sowing his grain where Some of il
fell in fruitful ground and some among
the powders and hedges and cacti with
which the land is numbered.
The method of threshing sheaves of
wheat, which is referred to in the text
that commands the Israelite not to
nuzzle the OK when he treadeth out the
corn has its counterpart in the old-time
California process of threshing grain
by letting horses and cattle trample on
it in a corral to get it ready for the
WinnoWer.
MANA land of brooks of water. of
fountains and depths that spring out of
valleys and hills; a land of wheat and
barley and vines and fig trees and
pomegranates; a land of oil, olives and
honey; a land wherein thou shalt eat
bread without scarceness; thou shalt
not lack anything in it: a land where
stones are iron, and out of the hills
thou mayest dig brass" This is recOg-
nizable as fair description of semi
tropical California. The natural pro-
auctions are the same in both cOun-
tries, and as for stones that are iron
there are tons of them in the south
ern part of the State-bowlders which
often pass for marketable iron until
they came to be tested in the smelter.
PASTORAL OCCUPATIONS.
The Canaanite lived in a region
which flowed with milk and honey.
This implies that he was a stock-raiser
and bee man, with just such natural
resources at his command as the cat
tie owners of the California foothills
and apiarists of San Bernardino enjoy.
There was also wine in Canaan to
make the heart glad and oil to cause
the face to shine. That is to say, the
people had vineyards as they do now
in the Napa Valley and pressed the
juices of the olive as they are now do
ing in Santa Barbara and on the
Rancho de la Nacion, further south.
In Palestine sandy barrens alternate
with alluvial valleys and warm, frost
less uplands and hills. 1t is certain
that in ancient times the soil was irri-
gated. Remains of conduits and reser-
voirs exist and there are traditions on
the edge of the desert that people once
lived there who could control the rain
and cause it to save vines from the
natural effects of drought and heat,
making the waste places glad and the
wilderness to blossom as the rose. An
obscure Scriptural text in which an
Israelite is said to have 'watered his
land with his foot, simply means that
he trod down the soft earth to make
channels in his garden for the little
stream that had been brought to it.
Men do that in Palestine today, like
wise in California. 1t is the same proc
he said: with the sole of my foot
have 1 dried up all the rivers of be-
sieged Places
Most of the native trees of Palestine
are indigenous to California. The ce-
dar and the cypress, the pine, fir and
oak are all to the manor born in Cali
fornia, and so are many surviving
Judean types of underbrush. In some
of the sacred valleys the wild mustard
grows SO high that birds might build
their nests in its branches" while along
the unfreQuented highways of South
ern California the tops of the same
prolific weed often meet above a horse
mans head. The mountains of the
Holy Land, particularly those seen
from the walls of Jerusalem, stand out
clear and sharp against the blue sky or
loom in ochered bulk along the far
horizon. In summer the hills are
brown with sagebrush and white and
gray with powders. but in the winter
green chaparral and gourd vines en-
velop them, and their little clearings
are spangled and gemmed with wild
flowers, among which turks a deadly
serpent, kindred to the whirring crota
loid of the Pacific States.
The seasons and their products are
the same in Palestine and California.
Taking the months one by one as they
leave their impress upon the sacred
country the author OF Bible Lands
finds these results:
MONTH BY MONTH.
=
winter month. Wildfowers bloom on
the plains, where cold is but moderate
by night and where a temperature of
seventy degrees is attained by day.
The last sowing of wheat and barley
is made and the final remnant of roast
ing ears gathered. A few trees are in
! leaf, Beans are in bloom. The almond
tree blossoms. and in rapid succession
| the apricot, peach and plum. Oranges,
| lemons, citrons and lines begin to
| ripen. New leaves are on the olive
| tree.
February-A profusion of flowers
spread themselves over the country in
rich carpets. Frost is seen on low
, ground but the days are warm. The
rains increase and snow appears on
| the mountains.
March-The latter rains" fall. Riv-
ers swell, trees are in leaf. pear tres
| bloom. also apple trees, palms md
blackthorns. Both fruit and flowers
are seen on orange and lemon trees in
| the lowlands.