a strawberry; and the
eucalyptus shoots often grow twenty feet the first year, carrying with
them in their rapid ascension the stakes to which they were tied. All
this is true. But here are two stories which may be doubtful, just to
show what anecdotes are current in California. "A man was on top of a
California pumpkin chopping off a piece with an axe, when it dropped in.
He pulled up his ladder and put it down on the inside to look for it.
While groping about he met a man, who exclaimed, 'Hello! What are you
doing here?' 'Looking for my axe.' 'Gosh! you might as well give that
up. I lost my horse and cart in here three days ago, and haven't found
'em yet!'"

"A farmer raised one thousand bushels of popcorn and stored it in a
barn. The barn caught fire, and the corn began to pop and filled a
ten-acre field. An old mare in a neighboring pasture had defective
eyesight, saw the corn, thought it was snow, and lay down and froze to
death."

As to serious farming, and how it pays in this part of the State, I have
clipped several paragraphs from the papers, and will give three as
samples of the whole. I desire also to communicate the cheerful news
that there are no potato bugs to make life seem too hard to bear.

"RAISED ON TWENTY ACRES.

"How much land do I need in California? is a question often asked. The
answer is readily made: as much as you can profitably and economically
work. A gentleman has made the following exhibit in the Los Angeles
Chamber of Commerce: 'Raised on twenty acres of ground, 2500 boxes of
oranges, 1500 boxes of lemons, 37,000 pounds of grapes, 2000 pounds of
pears, 35,000 pounds of apples, 15,000 pounds of berries, black and red,
1000 pounds of English walnuts. Besides nectarines, apricots, plums,
three crops of potatoes, 500 pounds of crab-apples, and one acre of
alfalfa kept for cows, and flowers of different varieties. These
oranges are worth on the trees $3500, the lemons $3000, the grapes $370,
pears $30, apples $75, berries $30, walnuts $80. The total will be
$7085, and all the products not counted. That surely is more than the
crops of a half section in Kansas or Illinois will sell for.' Every one
may not do as well, but they can approach it, and if they do, twenty
acres is quite enough."

"PROFITS OF BERRY CULTURE.

"Speaking of the profits of growing strawberries in Southern California,
the Covina _Argus_ gives some interesting facts and figures. That paper
says: 'One of the grow