26 WATER POWER OF HALIFAX COUNTY, NOVA SCOTIA : 



In the annual report of the ^ew York state Avater supply 

 commission, that body strongly urges the state control of 

 waters. This refers not only to such a regular examination of 

 water supplies for potable purposes as shall insure the detection 

 of any serious change in their quality, but also to the larger 

 problem of the regulation of stream flow in order to prevent 

 floods. The commission believes that it is unwise to allow the 

 appropriation of potable waters for power purposes, except 

 under such state supervision and regulation as is at present 

 exercised in the case of water-works plants. The diminution of 

 floods, the report states, could be brought about by the construc- 

 tion of reservoirs which need not flood public forests, an act 

 prohibited by the constitution, and the waters stored in these 

 reservoirs might be made a source of revenue. The portions of 

 the report recently made public do not reveal any definite plans 

 for legislation to carry out the suggestion, but the general pro- 

 position that the state should exercise an equitable supervision 

 and control over the unappropriated waters of the state meets 

 with public approval. The time is coming quickly when water 

 powers and water supplies will be appraised much higher than 

 now, and any failure to secure state control of them, so far as 

 they are -now unappropriated, may be unfortunate. 



It is becoming daily more and more apparent that the coal 

 mines, steamers and railroads cannot supply a permanent and 

 continuous generation of power so readily as the rivers. The 

 experience of the past has brought this home to all classes and 

 sections of the Dominion, till in some parts of the country we 

 are now appealing to our courts and legislative bodies to relieve 

 us from the perils of fuel famine. These conditions are but 

 the natural outgrowth of a national improvidence which in the 

 past has consumed our store of domestic fuel for power purposes 

 and has allowed to run to waste the easily available power 

 resources of the water which constantly falls upo'n our hills, and 

 will continue to fall while the earth is habitable. 



