Page:Mexico, California and Arizona - 1900.djvu/458

 438 honey-moon it was ideal. The orange bears a close resemblance to the formal tree which the mediæval painters used to represent as the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" of Genesis. It is appropriately placed, therefore, in our earthly Paradise.

Hist! The young woman who had been reading takes her stand archly at one side of such a tree. The man who had been listening rises also, and, with a slight yawn, places himself on the other. Oh, what is this? Is she a new Eve? She plucks a fruit, and hands it to him. Oh, this is terrible! Is there to be a fall again in Eden, and all its direful consequences? There should be some Cranach or Dürer here to take down once more the particulars of the distressing scene. What does Eve wish Adam to do? Perhaps she wishes him to buy lands—above their value—and go into orange-planting himself. Alas he will be lost forever to the higher financial life. Perhaps Satan is the invidious real-estate man. But really there is no pressing need of such a display of fancy because a young matron offers her husband a fresh orange before dinner.

Certain drawbacks—drawbacks attending upon an injudicious entering into this apparently fascinating kind of life should not be overlooked. The orange-tree grows all the time, and calls for incessant care, winter as in summer. Not a few invalids who had looked to its culture as a pastime have broken down through this cause, and through having taken up more land than they could manage. The lesson of such cases is, not to attempt too much, but to keep to the five, or ten, acres, as the case may be, within one's capacity. Nor has it been politic to put everything into the single crop of oranges. The smaller fruits—peaches, plums, and especially apricots—for canning, which come into bearing quickly, are useful in tid-