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thousand dollars into the venture. eminently well. The acreage he bought was thought to be a very poor agricultural risk. The government experts of the Japanese Administration of the Kwantung Leased Territory figured that it would take at least five years to clear the land of the rocks and stones in which it was tremendously rich. The South Manchuria Railway experts were of similar opinion about this particular holding. All of which meant that Mr. Awaya leased the property at an attractive figure.

It did not take any five years for Mr. Awaya to clear the land. He was reported to be rather extravagant with the number of his Chinese coolies. He has been the talk among the coolie labor of the district; for he devised a sort of prize system and gave the coolies additional pay according to the amount of work done. With him it was the result that talked, not the number of hours through which so many coolies showed their amiable way of loafing. The result was something that opened the eyes of the people about him. The rocks and stones which he dug out of his acreage were so stupendous that he had to find some means to dispose of them. Instead of thinking out some place to dump them, he evidently spent a good many of his high-priced hours on some means of making them a thing of value. The result was that he, with the permission (and high appreciation) of the local authorities, constructed an excellent road from the city limit of Dairen direct to his orchard, a road with a couple of feet of stone bed, ready to support all manner of heavy traffic in his heavily laden wagons. He completed the clearing of his acreage within one short year. Of course, in all this work, he invested a lot of capital. The wisdom of his investments was seen in the amount of money he took in in his second year. While waiting for the young trees to grow up to the fruit-bearing stage, he

devoted his acres to cotton and vegetables as a side crop. From this he realized 10,000 yen in his second year, I was told.

At Port Arthur in June, 1923, I attended a gathering of a committee of leading Japanese farmers and orchardists in Manchuria. To my surprise I found a large number of them were ex-California Japanese agriculturists. One of the leading themes discussed at that gathering was how to devise the ways and means by which to induce the Japanese now in California to come to Manchuria. From all I gathered at that meeting and through later inquiry, there is now being put forth strong and well planned efforts to take a number of Japanese farmers in America and transplant them to Southern Manchuria. I hear the efforts are meeting with considerable success.

There are many kinds of Manchurian pears on the market. But the most favored ones are Laiyang, Peking white, rose pear, autumn white, and honey pear. According to the experts of the South Manchuria Railway Company, who have done a great deal of experimental work with fruit-trees in South Manchuria, some foreign varieties do excellently in that section, such as Bartlett, Flemish Beauty, Duchesse d'Angouleme, Clapp's Favorite, Buerré d'Anjou, Wilder Early, and a number of Japanese pears.

Grapes are both common and highly favored among the native fruits. In South Manchuria, the section south of Chinchou is the most famous section for grapes. Grapes are not native to Manchuria or China. They came from Central Asia, the same original home of European grapes. They were imported into China in the days of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, some years before the birth of Christ; and they have done well in China ever since. The Manchurian grapes grow in large clusters and are excellent in quality. Indeed, they rank at the very top of market fruits. Their colors are white, purple,

and purplish pink, and with the exception of a seedless kind, they are large in size. They are much sweeter than the Japanese variety and have no bitter taste. Moreover, they have an admirable quality of keeping for a long time. They have another quality which makes them valuable as a commercial article: they have thick skin. Their skin is tougher than that of the general run of grapes found in American markets. Dragons' Eyes, Pink-chicken Hearts, and the kinds which resemble Muscat Hamburg, Black Hamburg, and Gros Colman are among the leading types of Manchurian grapes.

Apples are plentiful in Manchuria and are excellent both in appearance and in taste. They are entirely different from the fruits common to American and European markets. Although they are not as large as some of the California and Arkansas products, they are larger than those one finds in Japan and in Chosen and other parts of China. The flesh is as white as cotton and sweet. and juicy. They do not have the sour taste so common to other oriental apples and some American. This sweet taste of the fruit is prized by the Chinese above all else.

Peaches are another fruit crop which does well in South Manchuria. They are cultivated almost everywhere in Eastern Asia; but nowhere with better result than in South Manchuria. The flavor of the Manchurian fruit commands a high regard wherever they are sold.

Persimmons are not seen much in Manchuria. Climatic conditions there are not favorable for them.

There are no accurate statistics of the fruit-production of Manchuria. One Chinese official figure credits the Province of Mukden with 16,000,000 pounds of various fruits. The same authority figures the total fruit-production of Kirin Province at 610,000 pounds, and that of Amur Province at 100,000 a year.

After making an exhaustive study extending over many years, the experts of the South Manchuria Railway are

optimistic over the future of fruit-production in South Manchuria. Year in and year out, they are giving the orchardists the benefit of their scientific experiments with all sorts of fruit-trees. In addition to this educational service, they have already distributed, absolutely without cost, to various orchards, no less than 400,000 saplings.

CHAPTER VIII

ANIMALS AND ANIMAL PRODUCTS

We have already seen that the majority of the Manchu were huntsmen, warriors, and herdsmen. Time was, indeed, and not so many centuries ago, when the vast steppes along the Mongolian border and over practically all of the present Amur Province, up the valley of the Nonni and the plains to the west of the Sungari valley, where Kirin Province loses itself in the open stretches of Eastern Inner Mongolia, there was nothing but a sweep of grazing-ground reaching from sun-up to sundown. The steady northward march of farmer immigrants from Shantung and from Chihli has brought a large section of the wild land under the hoe. Still the memory of the pastoral age is plainly etched along the border of Mongolia this very day.

As the Chinese farmers have pushed their ever-victorious march into the heart of Manchuria, the old style herdsmen have gradually receded: many of them have disappeared. There are comparatively few Manchus who are devoting themselves exclusively to stock-raising nowadays. That business has been combined with farming by the Chinese invaders; and that combination remains all over Manchuria. The number of head of live-stock that an average Manchurian farmer keeps is comparatively greater than in other sections of China. One Japanese writer, as the result of his first-hand investigations along this line, declares that the average number of domestic animals kept by a Manchurian farmer figures out something like this: 5.8 head of horses, mules,

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