Arizona republican., 1910-02-06
THOUSANDS Of ACRES
 FILED ON YESTERDAY Opening of Valley Lands to Settle. ment-AlIotment of Lands
 to Mohave Indians.

The opening of Paradise valley and an area in the eastern part of the county. to filing by settlers under the homestead, desert land- or scfib methods. did not provoke a great rush at the land office yesterday, though there was rather a busy ses- sion until late in the afternoon Thirty-nine filings were made, total ing about 1000 acres out of a possible 100000 acres at the disposal of the homeseeker
 The homeseeker, however. was re- strained from getting in a big rush by the fact that the land is without the reservoir district and to prove up he must devise some irrigating plan Of his own or cooperate with his neighbors to that end At this time there is no probable arrange ment that can be made with the gov ernment to bring the lands under the Sale river project, nor is there much opportunity for appropriating water from any natural stream. About the only feasible plan in sight just now is some system of irrigation by pumping from the underground flow all of which may be proved eventu- ally to be very practicable. Only those who are associated with some project of that sort now, however, cared to take the speculative chance In addition to the filings made it is understood there are a few settlers already living on their lands who will have q few weeks more time in which to make their filings before they can be dispossessed, so they were not in any hurry A small acreage was also taken up by scrip and it is understood that more win oe
 The impression that there are yet 193.O00 acres of good land available should not be allowed to obtain, for while the figures are right as to acreage. about half of it is covered with mountains that never will be tillable. though there are still avail able many thousands of acres of as fine land as ever laid outdoors, ex- cept that there is no water for 1t.
 Another and equally as interesting an event at the land office yester- day was the receipt of the filings of 5s5 Indians in what is known as the Mohave valley. q rich tract of bot tom land along the Colorado river above Needles. These filings are merely the official recording of the allotments made recently by an agent Of the government. of fifteen acres to each Indian on that reservation, a total of S325 acres. On the 17th of this month the rest of the Mo- have valley will be thrown open to filing by white settlers, and it is said there is q large acreage of good land that will be available.
 On the filing of each Indian ap- pears his Indian name and the syn onym of it in English. or the name he has adopted as his white name for dealing with the government. and some of them are quite novel and interesting. while others are merely jawbreakers Also each Indian has made his mark on the document rep resenting. his filing. This was not done by touching the pen as the ig- norant white man does, but by mak- ing an impression of his thumb print on paper This was done after the digit had been washed to get the dirt off so the lines of the cuticle could be seen, and the thumb then dipped in ink Of the whole 555 no two resemble each other and the scientist who has studied those things says that no two imprints are ever found that resemble sufficiently to be taken for each other. It is also said that as a mans imprint is once made so will it appear ever after. unless he loses his thumb. It is. for some pur-