CALIFORNIA.

Colonist, Volume IV, Issue 426, 22 November 1861, Page 3

CALIFORNIA.

Corn.—Adverting to the great fall in the prices of Californian wheat, and speculating on the supply and demand in the United States, the Stockton Independent, of the 20th of August, remarks:— We do not remember the time when wheat was so low as it is now in California. In this market, yesterday, the quotations were 1 dollar to 1 dollar 25 cents per lOObs.; and our despatch from San Francisco the evening before gave the prices at 1 dollar 5 cents to 1 dollar 25 cents, or the smallest fraction over an average price of 60 cents per bushel. It is scarcely necessary to add that such, rates are ruinous to farmers who are compelled to dispose of their crops. Even with the best improved machinery tor cutting and threshing, 60 cents a bushel will hardly pay the farmers of Pennsylvania, Ohio, or Illinois, where farm labor is but a third or half as high as it is here, and where sacking and treightlng bear about the same relative proportions. No man can raise a crop of wheat even on the incomparably rich lands of this county, selling it at 60 cents per bushel, and lose less than his own labor, the labor of his team and the seed which he planted. The quantities of grain which have been crowded into this market during the fortnight just past, must be accepted as a proof that numbert of our farmers are so circumstanced that they must sell, though by doing so they lose. We deeply regret this, for the farmers are the backbone of the State, and whatever injures or cripples them becomes a general misfortune. Yet we think the worst is over. We believe that wheat has gone down to its lowest ebb, and must soon take an advance. Large purchasers and exporters who are not forced to make immediate sale will grow rich from the profits of their investments. It is the general belief that throughout the Western and Southern States this year's harvest will be an extraordinary one; that Illinoia, lowa, Ohio, Indiana, Wisconsin, New York, and Pennsylvania, with Virginia, have better crops of wheat than these States have produced in many years; and that the corn crops of Tennessee, Kentucky, Missouri, and other corn-growing Suites of the South are equally good. All this may be true, and yet it is almost as certain that grain will lo unusually high the coming winter in Eastern mirkets. We all know how the market prices of beef, pork, bacon, and flour rose in 1049 and '50 throughout the Western States, owing to the withdrawal of 60,000 or 70,000 producers and their transfer to the Californian mines, where they at once became extravagant consumers of the staples of life. At the present time there is scarcely less than 1,000,000 able-bodied men throughout the States withdrawn from the producing classes for service in the two armies. They cannot aid in gathering the harvest, but they will be most magnificent fellows in eating it up. What they consume, waste, or destroy in legitimate warfare, would feed 2,000,000 of men on tho farm or in the workshop. What will be lost from their absence from home and the inability of the farmer to 1 ai vest his crops properly would feed another million. So that really, when tlie granaries came to be gaugid after the harvest tiny wil be no fuller thau in ordinary seasons.

Cotton.—lt seems not at all improbals that. California will, before long, come into tho market with cotton supplies. On this subject the Weekly Alta California of August 24th, says :—The tule lands lying along the Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers, wlnn properly reclaimed, btj capable of producing as handsome cotton as t!ie plantations of Louisiana or Texas. For a number of years past, we have had exhibited to us handsome "bolls from ranches just below Sacramento, and we are assured that large and fine crops will be raised when labor txciines cheaper than it now is. On Middle River Ranch, some thirty miles below Stockton, Mr. George Douglas, manager for Samuel Brannan, owner of the property, planted in May last some seeds of cotton, which promise to yield a rich return. The seed was put in the ground in tho month ot May last, and," from a single stalk, the branches now spread out some five feet in diameter. The bolls are large and healthy, ai;d the crop will be fit for picking in November next. Even at the present high price of labor, it is questionable whether the culture of cotton on au extensive scale, in these swamp grouuds, would not prove remunerative.

Emigration from Texas.—Some se\'en hundred wagons are reported to be on the route between San Diego and El Paso, for California. They are mostly filled with emigrants from Western Texas. They represent, 1 am. inf jrmed, -that the condition of Texas since her secession from the Union is if a very deplorable character. Among others who have arrived, there is a family of the name of Kelsey (the same gentleman who discovered Relsey's Bar, on the American River, in 1849), who have suffered severely by the Indians on the way. Their train was attacked by the Indians and some depraved white men, wbo stole and took away from tlu-m every available article of food and clothing that they had. At the time the Indians made the attack, one of the members of the family, a little girl of thirteen years, ran away from the road and secreted herself in the bushes; after lying there for some time, she started for the road, where she last saw the wagons. On the way she was attacked by an Indian (as she supposed), who actually lanced her sixteen times, and then got off the horse and sculped her! While performing this last barbarous act, he said to himself in her hearing,'l guess that you aro dead, now, G—d d n you !' showing that it must have been a white man, as the Indians do not speak the English language. After this, strange as it may appear, she soon recovered sufficiently to regain the wagons, when her wounds were dressed, and she had a mother's care, under which she has recovered.—Correspondent of the Evening Bulletin.

An Editorial Privilege. —An American editor was lately robbed while travelling. How much the thief made by the operation may be discovered by the indignant epistle he immediately sent to his victim, returning the pocket-book:— ' You miserable loafer, there's your pocket-book— 1 don't keep no sich. Fo.- a man dressed as well as you was to go round with a wallet with nuthin in it but a lot of newspaper scraps, a pair of combs, two postage stamps, and a pass fom a railroad director, ia a contemptible imposition on the public. As I hear you are an editor I return your trash. I nem roha only geuiUmw,— Zdrnpoul

DIFFERENCES. Tlie King can drink the best of wineSo can I; And has enough when he would dineSo have I; And cannot order Rain or Shine— Nor can I. Then where's the difference—let n-e see— Betwixt my Lord the King and me ? Do trusty friends surround his y throne Night and day ? Or make his interest their own ? No, not they. Mine love me for myself alone— Bless'd bo they! And that's one difference which I see Betwixt my Lord the King and me. Do knaves around me Ho in wait To deceive, Or fawn and flatter when they hate, Ar.d would grieve ? Or cruel pomps oppress my state,— By my leave ? No! Heaven be thanked ! And here you sco More difference 'twixt the King and me ! He has his fools, with jests and Vjuips, When he'd play ; He has his armies and his shipsGreat are they; But not a child to kiss his lips, Well-a-day ? And that's a difference sad to sco Betwixt my Lord the King and me. I wear the cap and ho the crown— What of that? I sleep on straw and he on down— What of that? And he's the King and I'm the clown— What of that? " If happy I, and wretched he, Perhaps the King wouldjchango with me! CHABLES HjSCKA?.