IRRIGATION OF ARID LANDS. 367 



what can be done during the rainy season. The Coast Mountains 

 do not furnish living streams, and the Sierra Nevada water must 

 run up hill to cross the valley and climb the western slope. How 

 to get it over there is a problem vexing many minds. Several 

 companies have been formed, and surveys have been made, for 

 doing the work on different plans. One company proposes to lay 

 iron pipes about fifty miles, at a cost of several millions of dollars. 

 Another would carry the water in an open ditch above ground. 

 At the lowest part of the valley-trough the ditch would have to 

 be at least fifty and ought to be at least one hundred feet above 

 ground, for several miles. 



Under a new law of California, irrigation districts may be 

 formed, and a vote taken as to what, if any, mains shall be con- 

 structed. A majority of residents rules. The minority, if they 

 own land, help foot the bill. So do all non-resident land-owners. 

 The district where these great iron pipes aforesaid are proposed 

 would contain about eight hundred thousand acres. It was esti- 

 mated that five dollars an acre would pay the cost. A gentle- 

 man interested as a landholder, however, assured me that his 

 honest estimate would be not less than two hundred dollars an 

 acre. With plenty of water the land, now practically worthless, 

 would be well worth one hundred dollars an acre. 



It will be readily admitted that such gigantic schemes of irri- 

 gation as these must raise new questions of both civil law and 

 political economy. The constitutional conventions of the newly 

 admitted States spent some time in wrestling with the problem of 

 water rights. In all our arid regions property in land involves 

 property in water. If by going higher up the river or canon your 

 neighbor may divert and use the water you have depended on, 

 he might as well be permitted to take your land also, for it is 

 valueless without the water. Litigation over these water rights 

 has already given the California courts much to do, at heavy ex- 

 pense to litigants. 



The rights themselves vary. In some cases one man or corpo- 

 ration owns the water, while another merely has the perpetual 

 right to a share of it on the payment of a reasonable rate. But 

 this right pertains to a particular body of land, and not to the 

 person. In other cases each landholder is a shareholder in the 

 water company. The difference appears on the face of the stock 

 certificate. In the former case the name of the association which 

 has tapped, say, the Alpine Canon, will be " Alpine Water Com- 

 pany," while in the latter case it will be " Alpine Land and Water 

 Company." 



There are a good many of these land and water companies com- 

 posed of farmers. Here is a new element introduced into farm 

 life an element of business and of co-operation. Sometimes it 



