206 City Homes on Country Lanes 



the few States where no one ever dreamed of trying 

 to make merchandise of the melting snow and falling 

 rain. Irrigation was a purely cooperative undertaking 

 from the first, as much as the dikes of Holland. It wa 

 the first and most essential provision for the commoi 

 welfare. Men shared the benefits and the burden 

 equitably. Out of this initial cooperation grew a who! 

 fabric of cooperative industry. 



The only valid claim I know against the system i 

 that it required its beneficiaries, so far as the la\ 

 could be enforced, to pay tithings, or ten per cent o 

 their gross returns, to the Church. It always seeme< 

 to me that this was purely a personal matter betweei 

 the payers and the payee, and that the loyalty of th< 

 vast proportion of the payers might fairly be acceptec 

 as the complete vindication of the payee. At any rate 

 this feature is only incidental to the system ; it signifiei 

 nothing when we come to consider the application to th< 

 national life of this great and tried principle of leader 

 ship by the Government that represents us all. 



Many measures providing for reclamation and settle 

 ment were introduced in the 65th and 66th Congresses 

 several of them in response to Secretary Lane'; 

 propaganda for Soldier Settlement. All of then 

 frankly recognize the obligation of National leader 

 ship to the homeseeker; all of them go much furthei 

 in extending national aid than any previous legisla- 

 tion; all of them contemplate not merely the reclama 

 tion of the land, but the preparation of the soil, its 

 subdivision into community centers and outlying farms 

 construction of roads and other facilities of the com- 



