6 THE IRRIGATION AGE 



reclaimed; and that a fair share of each river and harbor bill shall 

 hereafter go for building storage reservoirs. To carry out such a 

 policy requires an effective national organization, which can only be 

 realized by active and general support. Commercial .organizations 

 are asked to endorse this policy and co-operate with the National Ir- 

 rigation Association. Personal co operation and membership in the 

 association are necessary for the success of the movement." 



NATURAL RESERVOIRS. 



Congress has for years been appropriating money for storage 

 reservoirs in the West. This may seem like news to many, but it is a 

 fact with which they are in reality familiar. Long ago the legisla- 

 tive branch of the government recognized the fact that it is the duty 

 of the government to protect forests and to reforest such districts as 

 are burnt over, to the end that the water supply shall not fail. In 

 other words, where the government appropriates for the protection of 

 a forest or ihe reforesting of a tract of land, it appropriates for the 

 building of or the care of a storage reservoir. The forests are nature's 

 reservoirs, and if it is economical and proper for the government to 

 recognize and care for them, why is it not equally proper that it should 

 build artificial reservoirs which would save to the country the millions 

 of dollars which now annually sweep to the sea through the waste and 

 flood waters of countless rivers? 



SHAMEFUL TREATMENT. 



According to recent Phoenix, Ariz., dispatches, some of the Pima 

 Indians at the Sacaton agency have threatened violence and rebellion 

 if their children are forced to attend school. Before this time the 

 trouble has been adjusted or suppressed, but in truth it would seem 

 strange if these Indians refused to send their children to school or to 

 believe' any word the whites may tell them. Of all the Indians of the 

 West, they, the most peaceful, friendly and industrious, have been 

 treated the worst by the government. 



These Indians have always been irrigators were such at the time 

 of early Spanish explorations and some dozen years ago the import- 

 ance of protecting or increasing their water supply was brought forci- 

 bly to the attention of the Washington afficials, and it was urged that 

 something be done to prevent their being cut off from the water sup- 

 ply which they had used from time immorial to water their little plats 

 of maize, vegetables and orchard. 



The matter at the time received the grave consideration of the 

 department, and since that time it has been referred back and forth 

 from the office of Indian Affairs to the Indian Division of the Interior 

 Department and back again, and then, under the spnr of some outside 

 pressure, to some special agent for a report, and so on. The numer- 

 ous reports made and printed on this case would fill a shelf. In the 

 meantime the condition of the Indians has grown steadily worse; 



