3 



There, all that was neces. ary was to find an unoccupied quarter section. 

 The emigrant was immediately independent and self-supporting. The cul- 

 tivation oi his farm required no change from methods with which he was 

 familiar. 



In the arid region the locations where agriculture can be practiced at 

 all are restricted, and the places where ditches can be built at an outlay 

 within the means of individual settlers extremely limited. The methods of 

 agriculture which must be pursued in an and State are largely different 

 from those which prevail in the humid region. The emigrant has to serve 

 an apprenticeship m a new art, and knowing this, he is not disposed to 

 venture upon it. unless it is under conditions which offer him some excep- 

 tional encouragement and support. The rapid and successful development 

 of arid States hr.s required two things: First, the location and construction 

 of irrigating works, in order that settlers may at once begin to earn a liveli- 

 hood, and, second, some organized agency to call the attention of intending 

 immigrants to the advantages offered and to assure the needed assistance 

 and instruction in mastering the unfamiliar art of irrigation. Without 

 going into all the details of the influences which have placed adjacent 

 States so far aheful of us in this work, I will give the leading forces in two. 



So far as Utah was concerned, the rapid extension of irrigation, an j the 

 prosperity of the farmers of that territory has been largely due to the inter- 

 est and aid of the Mormon churcb. It provided the money to build canals; 

 the emissaries to secure colonists to occupy the laud which they reclaimed 

 and exercised an iron-clad control over emigrants, in restricting them to- 

 email holdings; to the acreage for which they could provide water and 

 which they could thoroughly cultivate, twenty acres being the accepted 

 unit. The result of this is that all the water carried in the ditches thus 

 built is used and all the land under them cultivated. 



SETTLEMENT OF COLORADO. 



In Colorado the first impetus to settlement was partly due to a favoring- 

 natural condition, but largely to a fortunate legislative accident. The fav- 

 oring natural condition was the cheapness with which ditches could be 

 built from the streams leaving the mountains north of Denver; the legisla- 

 tive accident was the including of these lauds within the limits of the 

 Union Pacific land grant. The Greeley colony was located on these lands 

 because of the opportunity to purchase outright the railroad lands at a 

 nominal price. Ttiis was the beginning of a series* of colonization enter- 

 prises. The railroad Inud was purchased, ditches built to reclaim it and 

 both land and ditches disposed of to colonies organized in the East by the 

 promoters ef these enterprises. Foreign capital became interested in the 

 the work, a corporation popubirlv known as the English company invested 

 millions of dollars ir the purchase of lauds, the construction of ditches and 

 in efforts at colonization in this region. To show that the opportunity to 

 secure control of the railroad lauds was the moving impetus in this work it 

 may be stated that, while this section of the State was gridironed with 

 ditches, other sections of the State with equal natural advantages and 

 requiring no greater outlay in their reclamation stood still. It was not 

 until the State had control of the donation of public laud, granted to the 

 State by Congress without any condition as to the terms of its dis- 

 posal, that the construction of ditches became universal throughout the 



