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Rh wages of the men were at the rate of $24, Mexican, for five summer months, together with their meals which were four each day. The cash outlay for the seven men was thus $14.45 of our currency per month. Ten years before, such labor had been $30 per year, as compared with $50 at the time of our visit, or $12.90 and $21.50 of our currency, respectively.

Fig. 157.—Pumping station on the farm of Mrs. Wu, showing pump shelter, two power wheels connected with pumps, set at the end of a water channel leading from a canal.

Her usual yields of rice were two piculs per mow, or twenty-six and two-thirds bushels per acre, and a wheat crop yielding half this amount, or some other, was taken from part of the land the same season, one fertilization answering for the two crops. She stated that her annual expense for fertilizers purchased was usually about $60, or $25.80 of our currency. The homestead of Mrs. Wu, Fig. 156, consists of a compound in the form of a large quadrangle surrounding a court closed on the south by a solid wall eight feet high. The structure is of earth brick with the roof thatched with rice straw.

Our first visit here was April 19th. The nursery rice beds had been planted four days, sowing seed at the rate