THE NEW SOIL IRRIGATION. 75 



rights of free men in this Western land. The struggle has 

 been a very real one, not infrequently degenerating into phys- 

 ical encounters, but for the most part carried on through the 

 tedious, often exasperating and always expensive processes 

 of the courts ; but out of the uncertainties, losses, hopes, fears, 

 bitterness, persistence and faith of these years there have been 

 evolved definitions of law and equity which secure the farmer 

 in his water rights no less certainly than a good deed secures 

 him in the possession of his land. The profound antagonism 

 between riparian rights, the definitions of which were brought 

 over from humid England and, being found adequate, were 

 indorsed and confirmed in the humid portions of America, 

 and the rights for beneficial use, as found needful on the arid 

 plain, are settled at last in favor of the latter and in the interest 

 of the irrigator, though time-honored common law traditions 

 and precedents were invaded and a new process of adjudi- 

 cation had to be invented. Not only have state governments 

 been compelled to take the deepest interest in the problems 

 of irrigation, but the legislators of the nation have seen the 

 necessity for action, and the Reclamation law of 1902 was 

 one of the wisest and most far-reaching laws yet enacted by 

 the general Government. 



By the Reclamation law the proceeds derived from the 

 sale of public lands is applied to the construction of irrigat- 

 ing systems and reservoirs, and the lands thus watered are sold 

 at cost price on ten years' time to the people who benefit by 

 them. That is, bona fide settlers may buy these lands, not 

 less than 40 acres nor more than 160 acres, at the actual price 

 which it cost the Government to irrigate them, paying for 

 them in ten annual installments. As soon as the greater part 

 of the cost shall be paid in, the management of the entire plant 



