A NEW ZEALANDER AND UNCLE SAM.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 7504, 6 July 1903, Page 2

A NEW ZEALANDER AND UNCLE SAM.

[BY DONALD DONALD.]

THE SUNSET HOUTE

Armed with a ticket which measured three feet six inches long, I started on a railway journey, which carried me some ten thousand miles, through the States of California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahama, Missouri, Indiana, Illinois, Kansas, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Now York, Virginia, Wisconsin, Minisota, Dakota, Washington, Oregon, Manitoba, Assinaboia, Alberta and British Columbia in Canada. I crossed the Rocky Mountains in tho South some two thousand miles from where I crossed them in Canada.

The climate of California is very similar to that' of New Zealand, but I don't think the land is so good, even in their most fertile fruit districts, and I should say they had a much larger proportion of waste land.

San Jose, the garden city of California, population about 25,000, is a centre of the great fruit industry, thousands of acres of peaches and apricots wore just coming into bloom. Fruit-growers often encounter the old difficulty which used to apply to us, a rush of fruit and no * market. Tho factories having more than they can deal with, want it almost for nothing, and if railed to the towns the expenses are made to eat up all proceeds. Our remedy for this evil of cheap railage and a delivery service would help them out, but, unfortunately, all lines are owned by private companies, who have no consideration for small fruitgrowers. The Americans think that railways owned by the State is one of the greatest blessings that any community could have, and, no doubt, there are great advantages in a universal system, which cannot apply where each line is owned and worked by a different Corporation.

The Lick Observatory is the greatest point of interest in this district. : It is one of tho largest in the world, located at Mount Hamilton, 4,443 feet above sea level. The telescope cost about £11,000, Visitors are shown through at all times, but are only allowed to look through the telescope on Saturday nights. Montoray is well-known through being the locality of the Hotel Del Monte, a great tourist resort; it stands in a large garden or park, where visitors can enjoy golf, polo, tennis, boating, fishing, riding and driving.

Santa Barbara is, I think, about the prettiest place down the coast. They have a palatial hotel where American multimillionaires often stay. Vanderbilt, Bookfeller, Marshal Field and others were there during part of last winter. Booms have to be engaged long in advance, and cost about twenty-five shillings a day. Notwithstanding the high charges, there are few of these gigantic hotels whioh pay their shareholders. The reason is, as with many other American investments, an hotel costs, say, £250,000 and pays well, the shares are capitalised to three times that amount, and will then only pay one third the previous dividend.

It.was near here that we should have passed the train from Los Angelos, and we did pass it later on, but it had fallen a victim to a wash-out, and was an absolute wreck. Already a loop line had been constructed to let us get round the debris. I was pleased to think that we did not reach that wash-out first. Since then, on the same line, a train ran off an embankment, and killed and injured a large number of people.

Los Angelos is now very prosperous, buildings costing a million dollars are being erected. Tourists, the fruit industry and petroleum are the principal sources of income. It is a curious thing that oil should have been struck right in the centre of the town, and all vacant spots in that district have wells from. fifty to a hundred yards apart. Many of the railways are run with petroleum fuel, and it is even used to lay the dust on the lines. One sprinkling is said to last three months.

Santa Catalina Island is a favourite resort, reached from here by rail and boat. The steamer has a glass bottom, through which sub-marine plants and fishes can be observed. For my part I preferred observing over the side, especially in rough weather. It is here that the large fish called Tuna is captured. They weigh up to 2161b5, and a sea bass, weighing 3841b5, has been caught with rod and line. A run of twenty miles, occupying seven hours, has been known before one of these fish could be landed. They sometimes run out 600 feet of line and jump fifteen feet out of the water. The flying tißh, which abound in these waters, is their principal diet. Five tons of fish were once caught in half-aday hereabouts with rod and ,: ne.

I left Los Angelos by the night train; and, in the morning, awakened to find myself in the midst of a sandy desert. It looked like ideal stock-raising country, if only they had rain and water; but for, over a thousand miles, there was nothing but fine sand covering hill and plain, with an occasional Mexican sun-dried brick hut, used by the railway hands, Here, I first saw the North American Indian; and I think the less said about him the better.

The Grand Canyon of Arizona, one of the world's natural wonders, is twentyseven miles long, thirteen miles wide, and over a mile deep. Its great charm is the wonderful colours and shades created by every conceivable form of rocks, whioh have been carved into shape by countless ages of exposure to sunshine and rain. A chaotic mass of rooks reflecting every colour; not a canyon with stupendous mountains on either side, but gouged out of the solid plain, as if rended by some mighty earthquake when the world was young. The erosion of ages has carved monuments of long-past centuries into weird fantastio shapes. The contemplation of these marvellous effects, carries one back to an age when the earth was consumed -by internal fires—a time when vegetation and animal life were in the far-off future. It was in those remote ages that the Canyon of Arizona first became a chasm in the earth's crust.

In this same region are to be found the caves of the cliff-dwellers—a prehistoric race. Some human bones, recently discovered, are said to be many thousand years old. The Rooky Mountains, in New Mexico, have the same characteristic as those in the north; they resemble huge castles, with their walls and ramparts, built on mountains of granite, and roofed with a mantle of perpetual snow. They are more broken and rugged than those of this country. We now come to" tbi Atlantic slope, arid a futile effort is made to pick up lost time. '*

(To be continued).