here term the steam thrashing machine, most of it still lies in the fields unfathered. The straw becomes blackened by the fog, but the grain does not seem to suffer much. Thrashers were at work all along the road, and great piles of grain in sacks waiting to be hauled to Half-Moon Bay and shipped to San Francisco, were seen in many fields. The harvesting is done mainly by extra hands hired by the day. I met dozens of them tramping along the dusty roads, with their blankets on their backs. They do not stay long in a place, but get from two to three dollars in coin and their board for such time as they work, and then move on. Some of the old California Mission Indians still reside here, and work in the fields; and Chinamen are making their way on the farms and in the dairy. They get from fifteen dollars per month to nine dollars and fifty cents per week, and board themselves. A few get as much as two dollars per day in the harvest fields, and are highly spoken of by' the farmers, many of whom, however, are afraid to give them employment, lest their fields of grain and stacks should be fired in revenge by the European laborers, who are savagely opposed to them. The farms in the hills are smaller and more closely cultivated. Onions, beets and mustard are largely grown.
The great beets of California are among her vegetable wonders, and have often sorely taxed the credulity of Eastern people. Californian though I am, I must own up that there is something just a trifle like an imposition on outsiders in this matter of the production of these mammoth beets. This
