The daily morning journal and courier., 1907-03-20

Ous, Honest, Generous, Temperate
 Loyal and Have sundry Other Good
 Traits.
 A woman, Mrs. A. E. whiteslde, having listened patiently to the opin- ions of scores of men who knew noth ing at all at first hand about the Jap anese in California, now offers few remarks herself.
 My present home Is in the celery and sugar beet land in Orange coun- ty," she says in the Pacific Outlook. We have ranch of 16O acres. If the people who thing Japanese labor is cheap would get out and go ranching
 At present We have in the ground thirty acres of celery, the most ex- pensive and uncertain crop with which we have to deal This winter during the wet season in many of the fields crews of twenty-five men were work ing in mud and water up to their knees, trying to cut out the celery in order to save it. Where could we find the crew of twenty-five white men who would do this for even one week?
 For our thirty acres of tomatoes, five acres of cucumbers, five acres of string beans, and last many acres of cabbage and caulifower, it will re- quire dozens of men. Yet our ranch is a mere drop in a bucket compared with all the other ranches. We must have help. Where are we to get it?
 If the hundreds of unemployed white men of whom we hear. so much would put in an appearance 1t would be extremely gratifying to the ran chers of southern California. Good white ranch help does not work by the day very long in this country. There are too many openings in the way of small investments for the right sort of man, who saves his wages.
 Tn Fresno county one year the peo- pie tried importing Poles, Russians and Armenians to do their work. That was before the day of the Japanese. This plan worked beautifully that year but the next year each imported fam fly had home of its own and the trouble was all to recur again.
 Chinese labor, of course, is out of the question; so, now, other than the Japanese, we have no source of supply but the Mexican laborer or choo. In some respects these are good workmen, of a boss is constantly over them, but as a people they are about the lowest, if not the lowest, type in the United States.
 q have already said some things in favor of the Japanese, but will say more. They are, contrary to some printed statements, above all things else a cleanly people. In every Jap anese camp there is one of their quaint bath tanks, with a furnace un- derneath, in which most of them take daily ablutions.
 Their manners and courteousness, excepting in few instances ,are unex- excelled. I think no mother need fear for the contamination of her child's manners because of the. attendance of Japanese school boys at our public schools. Their attention to every small courtesy of life would put to shame three-fourths of the inhabitants of our beloved country, coolies or peas ants though they be.
 "They are a sensitive people. The love of the beautiful in both natural and material things is innate. Our beautiful mountains, hills and flowers are a never ending source of joy to them, and they like plants and flowers around them in the kitchen and their rooms.
 They are an honest people. Once ir while we find boy in the field try ing to shirlz, but he either improves or quits the job. The rest will not stand for it.
 They are a generous people. Many complain that they send their money back home. While this is true to a certain extent, they are liberal, ever lavish with their money, in trying tc adopt our ways and dress,
 "They are a temperate people and though many of them learn to like American beer and whiskey, I have never seen one of them intoxicated which is a great deal more than car be said of our ranch hands.
 "They are a loyal people, and il seems to me that a people who are loyal to country and ruler from love of loyalty, would, with chance, make at least as loyal citizens of the United States as those foreigners brought ir at our Eastern doors, loyal at home, i at all, from sheer necessity.
 "But above everything else, they are peaceable people I do not thinl they would submit to such treatmen from the hands of the American bo! as did the Chinaman-such things al the abuse hurled at him on the stree in public places, or in his house, tn, robbing of vegetable wagon and gard en, and the supposed joke of havint his pigtail tied to the seat of car a he get off so that he was dragged along by the car.
 "The Japanese, I say would not sub init to such treatment, but they de sire peaceful relations with all thei homes and in their pastlmes. I hay never seen a Japanese flag unfurle, at a camp without the Stars an, Stripes
 "One never sees a tramp amonl them; they do not fill our city jails o State prisons, do not stir up riots o strikes. adopt extreme socialistic mea sures, become anarchists, fill our in sane asylums or kill our Presidents.
 But the greatest reason for tn popularity of the Japanese as an em ployee lies in the fact that ne perform his every task as though it were pleasure to give satisfaction. We hay never come in contact with any othe nlace If la lnnrinor ,,nnnle nf nrhich tlni