The Florence tribune., 1898-12-31


 where freshets have not robbed the sol of its mineral salts, fertility has for centuries been accommodating, with the result that to-day, under proper irrigation, four acres of land, prodnc- Ing from three to five crops year, can be made to support family, while In the other farm lands of the world a hundred acres is after insufficient. A small piece of our arid land, devoted to semi-tropical fruits, garden vegeta- oles and forage plants, under irriga- tion produced wonderful results.
 In nearly all of the arid region irrigation is not only feasible, but has been proved successful IL is not always Financially profitable to the private corporation looking for eight per cent dividends /; but in the same sense that @ lighthouse, the dredging of harbor, or tue im- provement of . river is profitable, it would pay the community or the general government to open this great area for agricultural use, and so make it the comfortable h home of millions of prosperous people. Irriga- tion is one of the simplest processes in the world, and it's fundamental methods have changed little since the time of the Pharaohs. It is simply the storage and gradual use through out the year of the floods which come at particular season, usually in May and June, and go to waste. Artesian wells are in some instances successfully employed; but the main reliance in the west will probably continue to be the surface water. Although the system is SD old, modern science knows compar- atively little of the relation of water to the development of vegetable life, or why we apply water to the soil. It is known, for instance, that water may be so supplied to potatoes as to make them small in size and many in hill, or by a different application of water they may be made few and large. Water given in quantity to grain at a certain stage will make the crop run to straw. Similar observations in the case of fruit-trees are equally familiar i; but the whole subject rests upon in- dividual experiences rather than seien- tife certainty. An accurate knowl- edge of water effects will form the basis of the intelligent practice oi Irrigation. Already the agricultural stations in the west are making experi- ments in this line, under the direc- ton of Dr. A. C. True, and from them important results may flow.
 Our land laws are not the most favorable to the development of irriga- tion. The plotting is now done on the rectangular system, which is adapted to humid country. where one quarter section is as well watered as another. But where the rivers are few it may happen that one quarter-section will embrace all the water obtaina ble for a thousand sections. The man who then gets control of the waterhold is master of the situation, and those who come after him get nothing, because water in the arid regions is the founda. tion of value; without it land is worth. less. To avoid this result our public land should be divided in reference tc its water rights, and thus give every settler chance at its reclamation.
 In the early days of the republic when times were hard, the men who felt crowded in the east, or who pre- ferred the larger venture of pioneer life, packed up their goods in a four-horse wagon and started ou west to the Ohio reserve or to Indiana but these conditions have wholly chan ged. Although there is plenty O public land left, most of it is useless until, by the united effort of larg, number of individuals, or of tn government, water supply is pro vided. The Mormons went out to Sal Lake, and by community effort hay, accomplished wonders; but even op portunities of that kind rarely exist The sources of water-supplv now ar the great rivers, which can be dives te, only by the expenditure of hundreds 0 thousands, and often millions 0 dollars. Such outlays would be wei repaid, however, if undertaken by tn government in systematic fashion when the sociological results and in dustrial advantages are fully es timated. Irrigated lands tend to pro duce a splended civilization. Wher, land is 50 fertile that little of it i needed for one pair of hands, a closel. settled community of small proprietor generally grows up. People can liv just near enough too to have the ad vantages of good schools, churches am those wholesome associations whicl flow from community life, and at tn same time be free from the depressin influences of the great city. Wha 1 conditions could be more favorable