NEWS AND NOTES 



307 



this section. Fresh-water ports are always 

 attractive to ship owners and there is every 

 reason to believe that with the deepening of 

 the canal and the further improvements of 

 the rivers, these ports will do a vast shipping 

 business. 



Failing to obtain Congressional aid, a bill 

 was passed by the state legislature of Texas 

 conveying the constitutional right to levy spe- 

 cial taxes and issue bonds for such improve- 

 ments. Simultaneously a bill was presented 

 in the National Congress and the necessary 

 Government permit to make such improve- 

 ment has been granted. The proposition will 

 soon be submitted to a vote of the people of 

 Jefferson County and it is expected that the 

 issuance of bonds will be promptly author- 

 ized. It is estimated that $400,000 will be 

 sufficient to deepen the canal to twenty-five 

 feet and to improve the rivers materially. 



The fruition of these plans will be a decided 

 contribution to the commerce of the country 

 and great good is expected to come to this 

 section. 



^ V!i ii£ 



To Stop Water Waste 



The gigantic project of conserving the 

 billions of gallons of water that run to waste 

 in the twelve watersheds of New York and 

 transforming it into industrial energy, with 

 a resultant revenue to the state, is the sub- 

 ject to be presented to the legislature, before 

 adjournment, by engineers of the state water 

 supply commission, who have spent two years 

 figuring out a practical plan. 



Carried into effect at a cost which cannot 

 fall below $30,000,000, the scheme means the 

 wiping out of. villages and the erection on 

 their sites of huge dams and reservoirs ; the 

 ripping up of railroad tracks ; the submersion 

 of country roads and the forming of them 

 into navigable waterways ; the construction 

 of a system of reservoirs on the upper Hud- 

 son that will practically do away with great 

 freshets ; the enlargement of Schroon Lake 

 in the Adirondacks, so as to establish a con- 

 tinuous line of deep-water navigation for 

 thirty miles; the transformation of three 

 hamlets into water fronts, with piers at their 

 doors ; the plying of vessels between villages 

 over what are rocky turnpikes — why it 

 would all sound like a chapter clipped 

 from the prospectus of Mulberry Sellers 

 were it not buttressed by hard, practical 

 engineering facts. 



It is not likely, even after the two years' 

 survey and exhaustive investigation of the 

 tremendous possibilities presented, that a 

 full working plan can be prepared in less 

 than another year ; but when it is finished it 

 will be put forward as an engineering feat 

 combining beautification of the natural with 

 the utilization of what are spent forces never 

 attempted on such a scale anywhere in the 

 world. It is designed according to the plans 



of the engineers, not only to turn the com- 

 paratively valueless parts of forest and 

 meadow into spots of sylvan beauty, but to 

 increase the wealth of the state by adding to 

 its industries and creating new avenues of 

 employment. There are in New York 1,824 

 plants run by water power ; their total horse- 

 power is 830,000. The actual horsepower in 

 use is 618,942, due either to inadequate sup- 

 ply or ignorance of owners of the power 

 value of water as compared with fuel. If the 

 system of reservoirs and dams as projected 

 becomes an actuality, the energy will be 

 increased to 2,000,000 horsepower and with- 

 out any further encroachment on Niagara. — 

 Nezu York World. 



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Farms under Water 



While the "land water" must be kept from 

 flowing back to the sea unused, and Professor 

 Shaler in "Man and the Earth" suggests that 

 by and by practically all of it will be held 

 back for water power and irrigation service 

 until it has evaporated, yet he thinks that 

 none of it will be kept in shallows, in bogs, 

 and in marshes. It will be held by forested 

 tracts, in artificial reservoirs, and in lakes 

 of restricted area but increased depth. The 

 tillable lands of Holland are ten times great- 

 er than they were before artificial winning 

 of them from the sea began. This is well 

 known ; but most readers are surprised to 

 learn that one-third of Great Britain was 

 bogs and marshes in King Alfred's time, 

 and that all around the North and Baltic 

 seas the work has been only less extensive 

 than in Holland. In America we have done 

 practically nothing of the sort. Two hun- 

 dred thousand squares miles of the earth's 

 surface will yet be won for production by 

 such means as the Dutch have employed by 

 systems of drainage. 



^ ^ iii 



The Government Retains Title to 

 Coal Lands 



According to a statement given out at the 

 Department of Justice, the United States 

 Government has regained title to 1,120 acres 

 of coal lands lying in Mt. Ranier National 

 Park, worth about $100,000, by a decision 

 of the district court of Montana. 



The land has been recovered from the 

 Northern Pacific Railway Company, the 

 Rocky Ford Coal Company, and the North- 

 western Improvement Company. 



)^ )^ «i 



Timber Consumption in United States 



The systems of forest management and 

 wood utilization in the United States and 

 Germany offer many interesting compari- 



