noon
I have been told that he was the first of the foothill settlers to irrigate abundantly , the first to plant out an orchard and vineyard , the first , certainly , to create a garden out of a sage-brush desert . Teamsters hauling wheat from the Carisa plains used to stop to shake the white alkaline dust from their overalls under Uncle Jap 's fig trees . They and the cowboys were always made welcome . To such guests Uncle Jap would offer figs , water-melons , peaches , a square meal at noon , and exact nothing in return except appreciation . If a man failed to praise Uncle Jap 's fruit or his wife 's sweet pickles , he was not pressed to `` call again . '' The old fellow was inordinately proud of his colts , his Poland-China pigs , his `` graded '' bull , his fountain in the garden . `` Nice place you have , Mr. Panel , '' a stranger might say .