But he did break his promise. A week after the Titanic disaster we received notice that the season was at an end so far as "Oliver Twist" was concerned.
And now, having "come back" I foolishly determined to go back—and I started for California once more. I've always thought Greeley's advice should have read, "Go West, old man!"
I "GO BACK"
The summer of 1912 proved very eventful!
Closing the "Oliver Twist" season early in May I headed for California to superintend the development of my ranch at San Jacinto. Immediately on my arrival I began the laying out and planting of a hundred acres of oranges, lemons and grape fruit. It proved most fascinating work.
During the three months I put in at the ranch I lived in a big tent with a party of friends including Miss Moreland and her married sister. I was up with the birds and in bed by 9 o'clock every night. Employing as I was twenty men and ten six-horse teams, ten four-horse and three ten-horse, my job of supervision was necessarily a big one. I would go from one gang to another climbing hills which in a few days would be levelled! Oh it was big work—adjusting the miles of pipe lines and cement flumes which we manufactured ourselves during the process of grading, preparing the holes to receive the trees which were being prepared and nourished at the nursery of a Mr. Wilson of Hemet, two miles away, seeing that the hot ground was properly cooled by the water I had developed from a concealed spring in the mountains and doing the thousand and one other things necessary to insure the successful development of an orange grove.