_Covering._--If the weather has been favorable, the raisins may have been dried and cured in twelve days. Of these twelve days, the first seven or eight were used for drying the upper side of the raisins. On the seventh or eighth day they were turned, and on the twelfth day they were ready to put in the sweatboxes. But this is fast drying, and drying under favorable circumstances, with a dry wind blowing gently all the time. But sometimes it takes a much longer time to dry, say from fourteen to twenty-one days. In Fresno, where the weather is less favorable, the drying of the first crop may require from two to three weeks. In El Cajon it always takes two or three weeks for the raisins to dry, and in Orange county the drying sometimes requires from thirty days to five weeks. In Malaga the drying is accomplished quicker than in California, because there they cover the raisin floors every night with canvas, and in the morning, when the canvas is unrolled, the raisins are yet warm. The drying, then, has been continued all night, and the raisins have not had time to cool when they meet the first rays of the sun. In California, again, our raisins are cold, possibly even wet with dew or rain, and it sometimes takes the sun until noon to dry up the moisture accumulated through the night. To counteract this absorption of moisture, many of the raisin-growers in Orange county, California, especially around Santa Ana and McPherson, cover the trays with canvas every night. This method is to be recommended wherever there is any difficulty in curing either the first or the second crop. If this method is employed, I am satisfied that raisins could be grown and properly cured in localities where otherwise no raisin cult is possible. The method of covering the raisin trays at Santa Ana is as follows, varied by different growers, but in the main the same everywhere. The trays are placed together in long rows; about twenty yards long is found to be most convenient. The width of the row is just the width of two trays, or five feet. Thus the row of trays laden with raisin grapes is about sixty feet long by five feet wide. Along the north end of this long row of trays are driven down small posts every six or ten feet, and left extending about two feet above the ground. Along the south side of the row of trays smaller posts are driven down at the same distances, but not allowed to extend so high above the surface of the soil. These pegs or small posts may best be slanting outward, or from the trays. Along the high posts is strung a wire in such a way that it cannot easily get loose. To a long canvas cover are now secured small rings for running on the wire, and on the other side larger rings to hook over the smaller posts in front. If the canvas is only one yard wide, two widths must be sewed together so as to make the canvas six feet wide. The trays, which are two and one-half feet by three feet, when placed side by side will just form a drying