Arizona republican., 1912-03-18
IN THE DESERT
 0F TURKESTAN
Some of the Features of the Official Journeying of Arthur P. Davis in a Foreign Land Last Spring

OPliIlS
 As interesting as q bear story Is to a Kindergarten class, was the brief recital Of Arthur P. Davis, chief engineer of the reclamation service, 60 the members of the board of gov ernors of the Water Users associa- tion Saturday. when in the course or his remarks on matters Of business before the house, he told them some thing of his impressions during his eastern rip. Almost all the home people here know that Mir. Davis went tO TurkCstan a year ago for three months stay. ii was understood at the instance of the Russian government. bu few f any. had heard of the re-
 suits of his Investigation or knew much about the purpose of them. cX- ccpt that they pertained to irrigation as has about everything Mir. Davis has don" in the last ten or twelve years
 Hi,; remarks were of peculiar inter
 est to an audience of irTiSatorS for much that he sail was in Fh" line of comparison of conditions here with those in that far-off land. and espe-
 cially a cOmUarison or Ariozna meth ods with the processes of irrigation in that remote Asiatic country. It sounl- eJ somewhat like a fairy story devised especially for the big children who heard it. SD different was everything from irrigation as it is carried on in i thif country.
 Explanatory of his T'ss:ou 1Ir. Da- yis said hat for a I"ns time Russia has sought 70 intcreI- AmcricaE cap ital in dcvcopinE some of hc' latent resources Nearly two year. ago the i Russian government contcived the | idea of inducing Amcri"an capitalists l to undertake irrigation works in Rus | sian Turkestan. fiHally deciding on John Hays HammOnl as the most de- ,irablc person to take the matter mp with Mir. Hammond was sent for by 1 th" ear. whom he went to see and soon hereafter Mir. Hammond and his l associates put up 100000 rublcS for | the expenses of an Investigation. MT. | Hammond telling the czar that in or | der to properly appeal to American | capital the investigation of conditions | and their approval must be male by l some American engineer in whom they | had confidence That was consented to and the American government was 1 then prevailed upon to lent the ser l vices of Mir. Davis Tho result of the l trip was that Mr. Davis examined l two immense prospective projects. On 1 the way nome last June he met Mir ! FE1 IL 1 vcrscly on one of them and recon | mcnLed surveys and further invest- 1 gation of the Q her. He nam"! Rus I sian engineer who accompanied him
 on his tour as one competent to make
 these surveys MT. Hammond cablcd , for permission to proceed and prob l ably secured it. MT Davis connection l with the enterprise then ceased.
 II is timely Q say at this point that ! MT. Davis made no surveys. d"yotinG 1 himself tC q study of topography anI | such data as the Russians hal avail
 able together with general optical 1 survey of natural conditions Tn the | first place that was all he went there
 to do and in tho second place unless 1 directed with special authority he
 would not have dared to make sur
 veys. take mca surcmcnts or do any
 thing like compiling technical data, aS l the Russian government is very chary
 of foreigners who are looking for in ] forma ion" This is especially true in 1 Turkestan. where in addition to the ] regular passports ono has als" to be 1 armcl with special permits from the 1 Russian government. In this case, | however. there was 10 difficulty what l ever as he traveiad in q special car
 placed at his disposal. almos: to the
 scene of his reconnaissance and then
 outfitted with a caravan of campis.
 | To be moro explicit tn" outfittinG
 was done bv the Russians who ac-
 companicd him, hH being merely the
 guest of honor. with all the travelling
 details looked after Otherwise he
 would have been in trouble up to his
 ears most of the time for he couh not
 speak a word of Russian and when his
 interpreter was temporarily absent he
 had mighty little edge over the cameis
 in the caravan and deaf and dumb
 man would have had him faded from
 the jump to the extent that ne would
 be more skillful in tho sign language. Speaking of languages MT. Davis
 said it is quite notable how different
 one feels when viewing the same sub
 iect from varying angles. or view
 points. As young man he had a
 working familiarity with the German
 language but had practically forgot
 ten all ia knew about it. On the way
 over in March. 1911. lie stopped day
 in Berlin He had no interpreter and
 felt very lonesome. There was noth-
 ing doing in the way of conversation.
 Still he coulI gather word now and
 ;hen both there and in all the inter
 vening countries. for in all the west orn European languages there are