The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1903-07-19
two GREAT ENTERPRISES.


Kansas City Journal.
While the United States is scheming
to build vast reservoirs in the mountains
OF the desert region to be used as water
source for the irrigation of large areas of
farm land, the government of Holland Is
engaged in the no less interesting work OF
retaining from the sea great tracts of
land which will be used for agricultural
purposes. This Dutch enterprise is almost
worthy of comparison with our building of
the Panama canal at least so far as cost
is concerned. 1t Involves the draining Of
the great Zuyder Zee through a step-by-
step process that eventually will make dry
land of the whole of it.
First, a dixie will be built across the
mouth of the sea. a distance of twenty
four miles, at a cost of 100000. After this
dixie has been completed and the inflow of
sea water is under control a corner Of
the imprisoned sea will be surrounded by
bikes and the water pumped out from an
area of about s., 900 acres. This step in the
work is figured at cost of $5,OOO,O00 and 1t
is to be followed by the diking of another
area of the sea to the extent of 249,0o0 acres,
and then the remainder of. the sea is TO be
pumped. out, adding 225,O00 acres to the
total. The cost of the enterprise is fixed
al SIS, 100. The work is TO be performed
by the issue of bonds bearing 90 per cent:
interest. The land reclaimed is to be held
by the government and rented to farmers at
rate sufficient to pay interest and mainte-
nance, which is figured at about 81 an acre
per year.
We have compared this Dutch work to
our own enterprise of building the Panama
canal and ii leads naturally to comparison
of the methods of the two countries. For
ten years commission appointed by the
Holland government has been weighing the
Zuyder Zee project. With the proverbial
caution of the Dutch everywhere, the COM
missioners have pondered deeply over every
phase of the undertaking, and each year
found them drifting a little nearer to the
final report, which the government has
adopted. Here in America ten months was
all too long for our canal commission to
decide upon the preliminaries of that great
er undertaking. We went at it with slap
dash that would have given the slow-mov-
ing burghers of Holland case of nervous
prostration. Furthermore We expect to
finish the canal, even though 1t involves
twice the work and twice the cost, in seven
years, as against the thirty-three which
has been estimated as the shortest posi-
BILE time In which the Holland project can
be brought to completion.
But is ii certain that in throwing caution
to the winds and dashing helter-skelter at
every task which PRESENTS itself, either
or across co tSe ses
who proceed about their business with
such a contemplative slowness of motion
that one might think time crawls instead of
running away. When Jack embalmed in
precious memory by Mark Twain. declared
to the guide who had been telling him about
Moses and the israelites. Forty years!
Why, Ben Halliday would put enl
across in forty hours!' he touched the
most vibrant chord of national pride and
glory, but is it true note which We hear
sounded? In these blistering July days
when tinkling water calls, and the UNI
brageous mountain shades seem to beckon,
it is hard 10 work up much enthusiasm over
the spirit of push which puts EN- across in
forty hours. In truth, for the time being,
so long as the strenuous sun is doing such
a strenuous business, we must envy the
deliberative Dutchman who talks ten years
before beginning a job which we would
do in three, and whose calm life flows
always in such low and placid currents.