Arizona silver belt., 1889-06-01
WATER STORAGE AND IRRIGATION.


 where the rainfall IS inadequate to insure crop, has become question of much moment, and in the arid West much rich land belonging to the Coy nrnment is and has been fallow since The dawn of creation, yielding no sup port to either the Government or the multitude of people who otherwise would reclaim 1t and associate the ifea of plentiful harvest garnished with gelden fruit.
 The cultivation of the soil, aceer- ding to Vattel, lis an obligation i'm. posed by nature on mankind and every nation, according to the same nuthorIty, lis obliged by the law of nature to cultivate the ground that has fallen to its share But how is that to be done in country like Arizona where thirsty earth SoakS up the rain and drinks and gapes for drink again, unless the general gov ernmsnt assists in providing water stsrage, which she can easily afford to do by donating land, which in its present condition is uninhabitable and not worth a stiver. Or will the Government still persist in its supine policy towards western posses sions, which even begrudgeS pioneers (who emphasize their presence, by thelr thrift, in an Indian countryl that assistance which their surroundings demand.
 The total area of the United States Is 3,603,SS4 square miles, for which was paid s63, 100000, and which was acduired of Great Britain. France, Spain. Texas and Russia, and not an inch by discovery, which goes to prove that cur boasted governmental enter prise Is simply mythical, and that the push and energy which clears the for, est, by swamp and stream, frightens The hoeting owl, rears the log school house, creates history and opens the way for the formation of additional States, belong not to the class who figure "in my lady's chamber, or pos. ture before looking glass, but to those whose energies have carried
 
 them to where they find elbow.room, and who are now imploriag assistance from Rip Van Wrinkle Congress to render newly acquired possessions habitable by assisting in husLand,ng the water which now runs to waste without refreshing the soil Iu Esop's fable of tue dog in the manager, the hay and the OK illustrates the federal governments position on the question of water storage.
 While water storage is a secondary consideration to Congressional legisla- tors, they, no doubt, knit their brows. occasioned by profound thought of how to solve the Indian question, without having logically entertained the idea that the question of firrigalion might prove helpful adjunct to the army in its effort to extend tue bes- sings of civilization to where Indian superstition now, through the in- fiuence of their medicine men, leads whols tribes to believe that antago- nism to the whites is commanded of them by the great spirit. The effect of a supply of water in the arid West, easily obtained by means of reservoirs, would attract immigration, which would speedily surround our expen, sive, troublesome and dangerous no- mads with tue influence "of christian purity, in which hallowed influence no guilty thought can live, and also with the certain knowledge that the way of the trangressor IS hard, and under such circumstances would not the Indians also, like the white man, become "hewers of wood ard drawers of water, and If they will not profit by association, tell them of the fate of the Pequods who were, in 1631 almost wholly exterminated by the English, and the few who escaped were given to the Narragansetts for adoption.