Arizona weekly enterprise., 1889-05-04
The Butte Reservoir.

perity of southern Arizona in common with other portions of tue arid regions | of the southwest, and anything that | tends to the development of the water | resources is of the greatest import ance to the people. We of the Gila valley are particularly well situated in respect to the availability of both wa ter and land, and all that is required is the energy of capital to bring these two natural clements together. The water and the opportunity for it's stor- age are found just where the rugged mountains end and the broad and fertile plains begin. Nature has there fashioned a wonderful basin among the rugged hills and has left but little for man to do to gather the waters of the floods and safely hold them until their fructifying influence is required in the fertile valleys below Nowhere else within the great arid belt can more perfect adoption of natural con ditions of the kind be found. The very purpose of it's wonderful form ation is unerringly stamped upon this marvelously perfect work, and upon beholding it's strangely beautiful pro portions one is profoundly impressed with the evident design of that mystic hand that fashioned it when time was young for the benefit of those future ages the door to which is now ajar. Just think of the entire drainage of a country fully two hundred and fifty miles square-from the White moun- tains on the north to the sierras of Sonora, and from the eastern rang es of New Mexico to the Buttes at Florence-concentra into narrow gorge through the solid rocks, across which boy can throw a stonel Here is the grandest opportunity for public or private enterprise that can be found anywhere upon the continent to-day, and it is one that the government can cheaply experiment upon with the ab- solute certainty of achieving bril- liant success. We trust the senate committee that will visit Arizona in September may find it convenient to examine the combination of resources that exist here, and our word for it, they will exclaim like the Queen of Sheha upon beholding the beauties of King Solomon's temple, "the half has not been told me-" The honorable committee will find not only the natu- ral facilities for the creation of a huge storage reservoir at a small expendi- ture of money, but they will see town ship after township of level and fer tile lands of wonderful agricultural and horticultural possibilities, but entirely worthless for the want of the water that is now permitted to go un- interruptedly down to the sea in seasons of plenty, doing no one'any good. The impounding of this periodical excess of water and its diversion upon these arid lands will speedily make this val ley veritable garden of Eden, sans the uniashionable fig leaf and traditional serpent lurking around. This under taking is one of the greatest import ance to the people of this valley ant its early completion is looked forward to by all as an event that will mark the commencement of an era of won derful prosperity and grandeur. If i be the intention of the government tC proceed at once in the construction O storage reservoirs and in this particu lar instance to enter in good faith upor a work fraught with so much good tC the people, no one will be found to in terpose a single obstacle to the plan But if it be the intention of the gov ernment to simply withdraw all reser voir sites from private appropriation and to proceed with red-tape progres that is closely akin to living death a process that means the exclusion c private enterprise and the postpone ment of its good results for five, tei or twenty years, the interests of ou people will be best subserved by ask ing a special exemption from it bounty, for as a simple bushes proposition it is bound to enlist tn attention of private enterprise and be come a gratifying realization within the next two or three years at the eS treme limit. Every one at all fami
 jar with the experience of all work conducted by the government nee not be reminded that it never hurrie. even though the hope ofthose depent ant upon the completion thereof .a perish in utter despair. If it propose to withdraw this reservoir site fror market to hold it pending long year of consideration of the question of e, extending aid, the people of this va ley want none of it, for human life too short to hope for recovery fror such calamity.
 TIE desperado R. w. McNail, who's deeds of outlawry have made him tn special object of apprehension of ever peace officer of the territory. was r,