WESTERN. IBKIGATIOK. 263 



rills through the streets of the village, the gardens or 

 plats of its inhabitants, and the public square, or 

 plaza, which is designed to be its chief ornament. 

 Other branches lead to the farms and five-acre allot- 

 ments whereby the village is surrounded; as still 

 others will do in time to all the land between the 

 canal and the river. In due time, another canal will 

 be taken out from a point further up the stream, and 

 will irrigate the lands of the colony lying south of 

 the present canal, and which are meantime devoted 

 to pasturage in common. 



Taking the water out of the river is here a very 

 simple matter. At the head of an island, a rude 

 dam of brush and stones and earth is thrown across 

 the bed of the stream, so as to raise the surface two 

 or three feet when the water is lowest, and very much 

 less when it is highest. Thus deflected, a portion of 

 the water flows easily into the canal. 



A very much larger and longer canal, leaving the 

 Cache la Poudre close to the mountains, and gradu- 

 ally increasing its distance from that stream to four 

 or five miles, is now in progress by sections, and is to 

 be completed this "Winter. Its length will be thirty 

 miles, and it will irrigate, when the necessary sub- 

 canals shall have been constructed, not less than 

 40,000 acres. But it may be ten years before all this 

 work is completed or even required. The lauds most 

 easily watered from the main canal will be first 

 brought into cultivation ; the sub-canals will be dug 

 as they shall be wanted. 



