Page:Mexico, California and Arizona - 1900.djvu/417

 Rh tage interior, and late books and magazines were scattered about. It was a bit of refined civilization dropped down in the midst of the desert.

This lady had come, she said, for rest. She took pleasure, too, in the country, and in seeing things grow. She had made mistakes in her management at first, mainly through trusting too much to others, but now had things in good control. Four farm-hands—Chinamen—were employed. The eighty acres were distributed into vineyard, orchard, and alfalfa, about one-half devoted to the vineyard. Its product was turned, not into wine, but raisins. Apricots and nectarines had been found up to this time the most profitable orchard fruits. Almonds were less so, owing to the loss of time in husking them for market. There was among other crops a field of Egyptian corn, a variety which grows tall and slender, and runs up to a bushy head instead of forming ears. The sight of it carried one back to the Biblical story of Joseph and his brethren, and the picture-writing in the Pyramids.

The grapes for raisin-making are of the sweet Muscat variety. There was a "raisin-house" piled full of the flat boxes in which raisins are traditionally packed. The process of raisin-making is very simple. The bunches of grapes are cut from the vines, and laid in trays in the open fields. They are left there, properly turned at intervals, for a matter of a fortnight. There are neither rains nor dews to dampen them and delay the curing. Then they are removed to an airy building known as a "sweat-house," where they remain possibly a month, till the last vestiges of moisture are gone. Hence they go to be packed and shipped to market.

One must walk rather gingerly at present not to discern through the young and scattering plantations the bareness beyond, but in another ten years the scene can