STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 219 



eio-bt lumdred acres; a larger surface than the States of Massachusetts, 

 Ehocle Ishuid, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Vermont. Five and a half 

 millions of acres in this district, exclusive of the hillsides, are suscep- 

 tible of cultivation, and hundreds of rich alluvial valleys in the moun- 

 tains, which afford rich grasses for pasturage, and a soil and climate 

 eminently adapted to the cultivation of gardens, orchards, and vine- 

 yards, which will 3'et cluster on their surface. These eight counties 

 have, as near as can be ascertained to this date, produced this season 

 over three million bushels of wheat and barley, half a million more than 

 was raised last year in all New England. In like proportion oats, hay, 

 and corn, have been produced. Of stock, (eighteen hundred and sixty 

 being the last reliable date,) this district produced a greater number 

 than" Maine and Massachusetts. In view of these facts, why should we 

 not have superior agricultural exhibitions? Nothing but the will is 



wanting. 



THE NEED OE IRRIGATION. 



Cultivators of our soil throughout the State have found, at last, that 

 irrigation is an absolute necessity to the production of good and profit- 

 able crops, particularly fruits and vegetables. At present it is our only 

 fertilizer. Could this count}' be threaded b}' ditches and canals, as in 

 Holland, and supplied b}' the mountain streams, the extent of increased 

 crops would be incalculable, and the farm lands would advance in value 

 a hundred fold. Nothing is more needed tban water to make our valleys 

 ;^ut on the gorgeous livery of perpetual spring. Our soil is deep and rich, 

 but seven or eight months in the year of cloudless skies exhaust all the 

 surface moisture, render the soil in the summer and fall months parched 

 and dried up, and prevent thousands of fertile acres from producing sure 

 and immense crops, and adding millions to our wealth, and hundreds of 

 thousands to our population. Nature has lavishly added everything else 

 to our glorious State but frequent rain. ' Capital and engineering science 

 will j-et cause the mountain rivers to be tapped and spread their waters 

 over our broad plains. We must do here as all nations similarly situated 

 have done since the infancy of the world — irrigate our lands b}" canals, 

 ditches, and aqueducts. Some of the most costly and stupendous works 

 which the genius and skill of man ever called into existence have been 

 constructed for irrigation. In the old world, hundreds of millions have 

 been expended in building canals, aqueducts, reservoirs, and fountains 

 for iri'igation. On our own continent, Mexico, Peru, and Chile, centuries 

 ago, practiced artificial irrigation, and expended millions in perfecting 

 this system. And why should not California commence this feasible and 

 profitable system, which the ancients and semi-barbarous nations found 

 80 necessary and profitable? Thousands of instances could be enume- 

 rated, if time would admit, of communities which accumulated great 

 wealth b}^ exporting their surplus products, produced by a system of 

 irrigation. One instance will sutfice. In Loml)ardy and Piedmont, in 

 Northern Italy, irrigation has been carried to a great extent. The 

 plains of Piedmont contain one million three hundred thousand acres, 

 and less than one million acres are susceptible of cultivation, one third of 

 which is under irrigation. The total amount of water required amounts 

 to eight thousand gallons per second, conducted through four thousand 

 miles of canals, being a complete nctwoi'k of canals, the cost of which 

 is over two million eight hundred thousand dollars per annum. The 

 increased products justify this great outlay, being instrumental in devel- 

 oping all the resources of this country, and support a population of two 



