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cooking is completed. They are then packed carefully in cases and are ready for shipment. Thus prepared, this delicious vegetable is shipped to all parts of the world, where it finds a ready. and remunerative sale. The process of gathering and canning the crop must be repeated every day while the season lasts. It is a novel and interesting sight to travel over this vast plantation, and see the growing crops, the different processes of cultivation, the harvesting, and lastly, the canning, packing, labeling, and shipping methods.

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ONE OF THE 44-INCH CENTRIFUGAL PUMPS USED IN THE COLOSSAL TASK OF PUMPING OUT THE SUBMERGED ISLAND-7,000 ACRES OF WATER, 7 FEET DEEP.

cultivation-cutting, harvesting, canning, etc., requires arduous and varied human labor. The vegetable is cultivated in long rows-thrown up like a "windrow" of hay after it has been cut and raked together. After the asparagus commences to sprout, there is no end of constant labor. Laborers go carefully along these interminable rows, looking for the fresh, tender shoots that are just peeping above the soil. All these are cut some distance below the surface, by means of a sharp and peculiarly shaped knife.

In the course of the season, millions of the sweet sprouts constantly make their appearance and are cut off and harvested. This cutting goes on endlessly; for the patient cutters must go over the long rows several times every day. The sprouts must not be allowed to stand long; they soon become tough and stringy.

From these fields the fresh asparagus is hauled in wagons into enormous cutting sheds, where the tender shoots are chopped off to uniform lengths; after this they are culled and sorted into different sizes. They are then ready for the canning process; are thoroughly washed and placed in steam-heated salt water and partly cooked. After this, the "sealers" place the shoots of different sizes into glass jars and cans made specially for the purpose. When the jars and cans are hermetically sealed, they are placed in immense iron tanks filled with boiling water, when the process of

To produce asparagus of the highest degree of excellence, a certain peculiar kind of soil is required. That found on Bouldin island could not be surpassed in the world for the purpose. The en- . tire island is a reclaimed marsh originally lying below tide-level. This reclamation was wrought by means of building a dyke all around the banks. The soil is admirably adapted to asparagus culture

consisting of a sort of peat and sediment, and when perfectly dry burns like Chinese punk.

More than 50,000 acres of this marshy tide land in San Joaquin county have been reclaimed by a system of dyking, and brought to a high and productive state of cultivation. In traveling through that region, one may readily imagine he is in Flanders. It has been appropriately christened "The Holland of America."

To dyke Bouldin island properly, more than thirty miles of levees were constructed-costing a very large sum of money. The growth of this industry has been wonderful. For many years Germany, the native home of asparagus, furnished the world's vast supply; but even that country now recognizes the superior merits of the Bouldin island vegetable, and takes it in preference to the home product.

Asparagus cultivation has been carried on for a number of years on this island.

Once it was maintained on a very small scale and by primitive methods. The first year's output in 1892 was only 2,700 cases. Compared with the present production, the increase has been marvelous.

Large as is the scale on which the cultivation is now carried on, it may still be said that the asparagus industry is as yet comparatively in its infancy in California. The time is not far distant when many thousands of additional acres will be in cultivation-when California will be able to furnish the world's supply. Once asparagus was a luxury; now it has

was 300 feet wide, and 85 feet deep. After the immense break was finally closed, the company was confronted with the stupendous work of pumping out 7,000 acres of water averaging about 7 feet in depth. This colossal task was finally completed, though some weeks of steady pumping was required. Four immense pumps were installed. These consisted of two 44-inch and two 36-inch centrifugal pumps. The capacity of the two larger pumps was 65,000 gallons of water per minute, that of the two smaller was 40,000 gallons per minute. The total capacity of the four pumps per

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become a necessity, and is within reach of every 24 hours' steady pumping, was all.

For more than a year past, no crop has been cultivated on this island, owing to the fact that it has been completely inundated. Early in March, 1904, a disastrous break occurred in the dyke. Through this breach the floods poured until all the 7,000 acres were under water from six to seven feet. It proved a tremendous and costly piece of engineering to close up this wide and deep break. Several months were required to close the breach. It was about 1,500 feet long, the washout being from 105 to 20 feet in depth. Just at the dyke the break

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ting, canning, and cooking processes, the utmost cleanliness is strictly enforced.

The cultivation of these vast stretches of asparagus beds is a great task the year round; for, after the actual harvest closes, the work does not end. Then follows the removal of the millions of dry stalks, and after that the endless cultivation of the roots, and care for the general welfare of the vegetable.

The innudation of the island and its submergence for months, did not destroy the life of the plants, as might be supposed; for asparagus is a vegetable that will live almost indefinitely even under water. Of course the labor of leveling the fields up after the floods were pumped out, and getting every thing again in good shape, has proved to be a stupendous job.

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Protecting Running Trains

By Frank C. Perkins

NEW system has recently been devised by two German engineers, Pfirmann and Wendorf,

of Frankfort, for the protection of trains by engine cab signaling that is, through the delivery, by means of an electric contact rail and other appropriate devices, of audible or visible. signals in the locomotive cab. The track construction is provided with a third rail

very much smaller than the running rails, and the engines are provided with current collectors or brushes rubbing against the third rail, which may be located, as in the instances shown, between the tracks. The current collector is connected with the axles and the running rails through a battery and relay, the arrangement being such that the armature is attracted and closes a local circuit in the engine

cab when the intensity of the current reaches a predetermined limit. The closing of this local circuit operates a lamp signal or an audible signaling device such as a gong, or the braking apparatus may be actuated as well.

In this manner it is possible for the locomotive engineer to be warned of danger caused by an open switch. Under ordinary conditions. the coil of the relay is not excited, the circuit

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SHOWING CENTRAL RAIL AND COLLECTOR OF NEW GERMAN SYSTEM FOR PROTECT of the battery on the

ING TRAINS BY MEANS OF ENGINE CAB SIGNALS.

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EXAMPLE OF DOUBLE-TRACK CONSTRUCTION IN GERMANY. Track at right is equipped with collector rail for protecting trains by engine cab signals.

engine being open in its normal condition. A short circuit is made between the running rail and the live third rail if a switch is open; and in case a locomotive passes onto this section of track, the battery-relay circuit is closed by the running rails and the third rail which are thus electrically connected by the open switch. The signal will not be given at once, as the armature of the relay of the safety apparatus in the locomotive cab will not be attracted until the distance from the signal where the rails are connected is such that the intensity of the current is sufficient to close the local circuit. A resistance coil of several ohms is connected with the live rail at distances of between 300 and 400 feet. When the locomotive reaches a distance from the open switch such that the resistance of these coils together with the rails has fallen to a predetermined value, the current passing through the

relay coils reaches the proper amount to attract the armature, and the local circuit is closed, giving the audible or visible signal in the engine cab, or applying the brakes, according to the arrangement thought best under the conditions.

This new system of engine cab signaling has been installed on several miles of the German State Railway system, and is said to be operating successfully.

The system, moreover, includes provision for the locomotive engineer on

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TRACK WITH COLLECTOR RAIL INSTALLED ON ELEVATED RAILWAY STRUCTURE

IN GERMANY.

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order that there may be no failure of the automatic signaling due to the apparatus on the two trains opposing each other as a result of the batteries being connected in series or in opposition, thus causing the relays in one case to fail to work, a commutator has been provided on the axles of the trains so that the current is reversed periodically; and therefore the batteries will be in series or opposition alternately as the speed of the two trains is never likely to be the same. When a train stops, the battery is disconnected, and a connection is made from the center rail through the relays with the axle. These connections are the same as though the open switch closed the circuit, and any train approaching a standing train would automatically give the alarm in both cabs. The system is said to be thoroughly practicable, and the possibility of one engineer communicating with another is certainly most unique and desirable.

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