Irrigation Farming in Australia. 13 



River, flowing from the north-east, and 60 miles later the united 

 waters flow into the Murray. 



The Riverina plains between the mountains and the Lachlan 

 Junction is the area now being settled by hundreds of small farmers 

 on irrigation blocks similar to those already described in Victoria 

 The shorter name for the Murrumbidgee irrigation area is Yanco. 

 The Yanco Estate was formerly the huge sheep run of one of the 

 biggest squatters in Australia, Sir Samuel McCaughey. Sir Samuel 

 still lives in a beautiful country house on part of his estate, but he 

 has sold the greater portion of it to the New South Wales Govern- 

 ment for closer settlement.. 



The engineering scheme is on a mighty plan, but really simple 

 enough. It is to dam off the river up in the mountains, and regulate 

 the flow down its bed to the diversion weir in the plains below. The 

 dam has been building for over four years, and is now nearly 

 finished ; nearly two years ago its construction was sufficiently 

 advanced to begin irrigation. The site of the dam Burrinjuck 

 might almost have been designed by Nature for this very purpose. 

 Two great granite hills at this spot force the river through a deep 

 and narrow gorge between them ; their names are Black Andrev/ 

 and Barren Jack, and Barren Jack is the English corruption of the 

 original native name of Burrinjuck (or Burrinyuck), which has been 

 testored to the dam itself. It makes a striking landmark in the 



VIEW OP BURRINJUCK, NEW SOUTH WALES 



distance the solid, white, and comparatively puny wall between 

 the two towering brown rocks which Nature put in for gateposts. 

 Yet the Burrinjuck Dam can hardly be called puny. It is 240 ft. 

 high, and its width is 160 ft. at the river bed and 18 ft., at the crest. 



