THE PROGRESS OF WESTERN AMERICA. 



special agent in the agricultural department of the 

 census under Mr. John Hyde. The report is a con- 

 venient volume of 283 pages, nicely printed and hand- 

 somely illustrated. Like everything that comes from 

 Mr. Newell, the work is most conservative in its tone. 

 Portions of it were issued in the form of bulletins as 

 the work progressed, and some criticism was made 

 at the time by residents of states who felt that estim- 

 ates of values, as well as statistics relating to the 

 number of irrigators and kindred matters, were under- 

 stated. Very likely such criticism may be heard 

 again. Like all men of scientific attainments, Mr. 

 Newell has a horror of exaggeration, but he has also 

 the scientific respect for facts. He has unquestion- 

 ably exhausted the resources at his command to get 

 at the actual truth. The scope of the report is indi- 

 cated in the following list from the table of contents: 

 Number of farms and area irrigated ; percentage of 

 land surface irrigated; percentage of number of farms 

 irrigated; percentage of farm area irrigated; char- 

 acter of crops and proportion irrigated; value of land 

 and crops; size of farms; cost of irrigation; total in- 

 vestment and enhanced value; cost of irrigating can- 

 als; water supply; duty and value of water; rainfall; 

 artesian wells; reservoirs; methods of conducting 

 water; methods of applying water. This is followed 

 by a detailed statement of irrigation in the eleven 

 arid States and Territories, and the five sub-humid 

 States. The report is therefore a mine of information 

 which should be in the possession of everybody inter- 

 ested in its subject. All the maps and illustrations 

 are well chosen and the diagram showing the rainfall 

 in different portions of the country are particularly 

 striking. 



The value of a public report of this kind 

 The Weak- . . , 



ness of is in the broad generalizations which can 



Statistics. b e gathered from it. The value does 

 not reside in its details. The broad facts brought 

 out in this volume, are as follows: That of the 

 great domain lying between the 97th meridian and 

 the Pacific Ocean, only four-tenths of 1 per cent, 

 were irrigated in 1890; that all portions of this half 

 of the United States will produce abundantly and 

 support dense populations under proper systems of 

 irrigation and methods of cultivation, the limitation in 

 all cases being the extent of available water supply; 

 that here half a continent remains to be conquered 

 for the human race. It is not for the statistician to 

 deal with institutions, not even to the extent of draw- 

 ing from history lessons on which to build the hopes 

 of the future. Any man who seeks in this report in- 

 spiration for the building of States will seek in vain ( 

 beyond the broad generalizations which have already 

 been noted and which stand out as clearly as moun- 

 tain peaks against the sky. According to the best in- 

 formation which Mr. Newell could obtain from 



farmers the average value of the products of irrigated 

 lands is $14.89. This was arrived at by dividing the 

 reported value of crops by the number of acres re- 

 ported to have been irrigated. This was the only 

 method open to Mr. Newell, but of course the result 

 is idiotic. The most conservative farmer in the 

 most conservative community of the arid region 

 would repudiate these figures, and yet Mr. Newell 

 must necessarily accept them because the census 

 machine ground them out. The number of acres 

 irrigated were probably exaggerated as is gen- 

 erally the case, while the value of crops sold, 

 consumed or on hand, was, of course, merely guessed 

 at. The average farmer does not keep elaborate 

 books to show the value of farm produc ts consumed 

 Many of them do not even keep track of what they 

 sell. So we say that in matters of detail relating to 

 economic conditions the public statistician cannot 

 materially assist us. The IRRIGATION AGE has no 

 sympathy with people who advertise that $1,000 per 

 acre can be realized from irrigated land, and it trusts 

 that nobody will be so grossly deceived as to imagine 

 that $14.89 is a fair average of possibilities in this 

 line. Mr. Newell is all right when he has real infor- 

 mation to deal with, as in the case of the gauging of 

 the streams. He is properly conservative and 

 cautious in drawing deductions from ascertained 

 facts. But in dealing with details where it is impos- 

 sible to obtain information of real value he can only 

 give the best he has. 



F. H. Newell The California district system has been 

 California studied by many impartial minds and it 

 Districts, is always interesting to get a fresh light 

 upon it. Mr. Newell devotes considerable attention 

 to the matter, and presents a table showing the 

 amount of land in the various districts with the 

 amount of bonds voted and the amount sold or ex- 

 changed. Concerning the effects of this law Mr. 

 Newell says: 



In the five years following the passage of this act upward of 

 forty irrigation districts have been formed or seriously proposed, 

 and the greater number of these have completed their organiza- 

 tion and offered bonds for sale. There has been considerable dif- 

 ficulty in disposing of these bonds for cash for various reasons, 

 many of these growing out of the novelty of the matter. At first 

 there was a long struggle in the court before the constitutional- 

 ity of the act and the amendments were settled beyond question. 

 The main point being triumphantly carried there have been 

 many details requiring exact interpretation and definition by le- , 

 gal decision. Meanwhile, in the practical operations of many of 

 the districts, trouble and unforeseen contingencies have arisen 

 which have tended! to render capitalists unusually cautious 

 and unusually timid. The management of affairs of this kind, 

 although in theory not novel, has in operation developed pecu- 

 liar features. Apparently in each community it should be easy 

 to select men of intelligence to conduct affairs of a municipal 

 corporation, which in many respects the irrigation districts dif- 

 fers a little, but unfortunately the election of district officials has 

 not in many cases brought the best men to the front, and the. 



