California is not unjustly called the Italy of the United States. The difficulty lies in the enormous distance between this great producing State and the older portions of the Union. It is almost impossible that we at the East should ever derive much advantage from her superior fruit region, unless it be in the way of wine or conserves. Notwithstanding this, we look with deep interest upon the facte set forth by their societies, and are not a little astonished at the transformation which the sudden influx of American mind and American industry has caused in the aspect of nature. The Report affords matter for thought, and for extended extracts had we the space at command. Lacking that, we can give but a hasty synopsis of the most wonderful doings which it has been our good fortune to chronicle.

At A. P. Smith's, near Sacramento, the Visiting Committee found one set of men gathering mature vegetables for market, while another was cultivating those half grown, and still another planting seed of the same sort Mr. Smith sends cucumbers to market on the first of January. Mr. John Wolfskill sold last year, from six apricot trees, two thousand pounds, at seventy-five cents per pound. One of his fig trees, six years old, measures two feet four inches in circumference, and is thirty feet high. One hundred miles from Stockton, the Messrs. Thompson, the pioneers of fruit culture in the State, have an orchard, nursery, and vineyard of 165 acres, handsomely fenced in and partly surrounded by wide double avenues four miles in length, lined on either side by fruit and ornamental trees, affording shelter and a fine park-like drive. Almost everything seems to thrive, from hops, pea-nuts, and tobacco, to the evergreen oak; but it is noticeable that irrigation* has to be resorted to, and we remark that it is believed the gold-diggers are preparing the lands for future use, in a most satisfactory manner by thorough draining.

A Mr. Haraszthy has 280 varieties of grapes, and expected to make 10,000 gallons of wine last season, and we note, but cannot particularize, greatly increased enthusiasm in regard to grape-culture and wine-making; there are now over three millions of grape vines in the State!

In the vicinity of Petaluma, are more than 130 large dairies; the sales last year of butter, cheese and poultry, exceeded 600,000 dollars. Honey is of the finest quality; price per pound, fifty cents; price of swarms in hive, one hundred dollars! A Mr. Fallon has four old pear-trees planted by the Spaniards sixty years ago, and grafted in 1854 with the Bartlett, producing 3,000 pounds the past season, which sold for six hundred dollars! Think of that Mr. Allen! one hundred and fifty dollars a tree. The figures are all large; Mr. George Lee has five and a-half acres containing 1,000 orange trees; he has also the pine apple, banana, citron, lemon, coffee, nine varieties of acacia, and many other tropical fruits and shrubs, all healthy and vigorous; and besides, his orchard has an amount of peach, plum, and cherry trees, and strawberries which perfectly bewilder us.

The Messrs. Sansevaine Brothers have 53,000 vines, and expected to make 80,000 gallons of wine last year; their eight large cellars filled with wine and brandy, present an astonishing picture of rapid wealth. But we must hold, and with a single extract to be digested by the northern man, leave this fascinating landscape: "The agriculturist and horticulturist from sterile New England, who lives one-third of the year in a snow-bank and the balance in hard toil to rid his fields of trees, stumps and stones, here has nothing to do but to turn the furrow, plant his seed, and in due time a sure and abundant crop follows. A climate, too, for evenness of temperature, health, and salubrity unsurpassed. The adaptability of these valleys and lull-sides (Sierra Nevada) for fruit-growing, is just being discovered. The monstrous pears, apples, peaches, and plums, raised the past season, surpass all others grown in the State. * * They undoubtedly will turn the present Mediterranean fleet of 643 vessels which annually leave for the Atlantic ports loaded with figs, lemons, limes, oranges, products of the vine, almonds, currants and raisins, to the amount of seven and a-quarter millions, to Californian shores".

* A mode of irrigation is thus described: "The water is raised into a tank and distributed through the garden by means of a red-wood flame under the earth. There are pieces of lead pipe extending from the flume about two inches above the earth at every tree. These pipes are capped and a small hole pierced in the top; on turning the faucet that lets the water into the flume, each pipe throws a jet about six feet in height, making a very pleasant sight and acting on the trees and plants like a rain-shower.

The New York State Agricultural Society has issued its list of premiums and regulations for the 18th Annual Exhibition to be held at Syracuse, October 5th to 8th, 1858. It is an extremely satisfactory list both for the exhibitor and the public. We desire to call attention particularly to the following new features, which appear to mark progress, and which will serve for a model for imitation. In addition to liberal gifts for all kinds of excellence, there is a premium of $250, (gold medal or money,) for an approved work of about 100 pages on the edible fishes of the State, which are susceptible of domestication and cultivation, including migratory kinds. This is a most important movement, and deserves the thanks of every citizen. $100 are also appropriated for an approved article on " The Quantity, Conditions, and Economy of the Nitrogen of Soils;" $250 is offered for a Steam Engine, or other Steam Apparatus that shall successfully introduce cultivation by steam; experiments with wheat, etc.,etc., are to be rewarded according to a judicious plan; and in addition, there is a"Discretionary Department," for " improvements useful to the farmer, and having valuable properties, articles of ingenuity, usefulness and merit." Here is food for reflection, and much that may be taken up by other societies to advantage.

Progress is indeed the word; what the country will become when it is " all fenced in," and the politicians are penned up at home, it would not be safe to prophecy.