THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



80S 



and now it is cultivated with astonishing success the 

 same as wheat, barley, or any other cereal. 



Nature, through heavy rains and other water 

 sources, converts the soil into a storage reservoir by 

 establishing a water table beneath the surface from 

 which the water vaporizing up constantly moistens the 

 growing stratum of the soil, decomposes and dissolves 

 the salts which are necessary to plant life, and is itself 

 decomposed by the principle of life in the plant and 

 its elements, oxygen, hydrogen, and nitrogen, utilized 

 in the interior of the plant itself. Where there is no 

 natural supply of water for this storage purpose irriga- 

 tion must copy nature and provide one, or at least 

 furnish an adequate supply of moisture for solvent pur- 

 poses. When that has been done everything has been 

 done that should be done. 



cuit. Whru the sap reaches the leaves it parts with a 

 portion of its water, and in some plants the quantity is 

 very considerable. An experiment with a sunflower, 

 three and one-half feet high, disclosed the fact that its 

 leaves lost during twelve hours of one day, 30, and of 

 another, 20 ounces of water, while during a warm night,, 

 without dew, it lost only three ounces, and, on a dewy 

 night, lost none. 



All this evaporation or exhalation of water from 

 the leaves of plants is supplied by the moisture in the 

 soil, for plants generally do not drink in water through 

 their leaves but through their roots, and when the 

 escape of water from the leaves is more rapid than the 

 supply from the roots the leaves droop, dry and wither, 

 because then they are drawing from their sap, living, 

 so to speak, upon their own blood. This evaporation 



1. Catholic. 



4. Church of the Good Shepherd. 



6. Presbyterian. 



A familiar illustration of the action of moisture 

 may be witnessed in the slaking of lime in the open air 

 without the direct application of water. The same 

 transformation takes place in the case of all the other 

 soluble mineral salts when in the presence of moisture. 

 This transformation effected, the plant thrives, and, to 

 give it an excess of dissolving liquid is to float off the 

 material needed by the plant and thus deprive it of. its 

 nourishment. It is like feeding an infant on thin, 

 weak soup instead of nourishing bouillon and expecting 

 it to thrive. 



EVAPORATION FROM PLANTS. 



The tendency of plants is to exhale or perspire 

 moisture as well as the soil. The flow of the sap is con- 

 stant from the roots to the leaves to receive oxygen and 

 carbonic acid and back again to the roots; like the 

 circulation of the blood in animals it travels in a cir- 



SOME CHURCHES OF OGDEN, UTAH. 

 2. Congregational. 



3. Mormon Tabernacle. 

 5. M. E. Church. 

 7. Baptist. 



in the plant is similar to the perspiration constantly 

 exuding from the skins of healthy animals and it has 

 added to it the mechanical evaporation which takes 

 place on the surface of all moist bodies when exposed to 

 hot or dry air. There can be no growth or health 

 without it, hence, it is often beneficial to wash or spray 

 the leaves of plants and trees to remove the dust or 

 other clogging material that has accumulated upon the 

 leaves and "stopped perspiration." To stop this leaf 

 evaporation is to kill the plant as surely as was killed 

 the boy in the Roman pageant. His entire body was 

 gilded with gold leaf, the intention being to have him 

 pose as a golden statue. His entire body was covered 

 with gum on which was laid the gold leaf. He died in 

 a few hours and it was not until the cause of his sudden 

 death was investigated by scientific men that it was 

 discovered that the closing of the pores of the skin, 



