THE GLEANERS 97 



and flooded the district, causing immense loss 

 to the farmers who had crowded the flat floor 

 of the drained area to plant and till crops. It 

 was finally found necessary to do away with 

 the picturesque wind mills and substitute 

 steam power. To-day the district once oc- 

 cupied by the great lake is a plain traversed 

 by a network of roads, furnishing homes for 

 upward for 20,000 people. Three immense 

 pumping plants of 350 horse-power each, with 

 a capacity of 2,000 feet of water a minute, hold 

 back the tide from the door-steps of the thrifty 

 Dutch. England, France, Germany and Italy 

 have followed in the footsteps of the hard- 

 pressed Dutch, and, with the perfection of 

 mechanical contrivances of the last hundred 

 years, they have solved the problems of drain- 

 ing fens and marshes, and provided volumi- 

 nous literature from which we can glean to ad- 

 vantage. Remember, in this connection, that 

 the ultimate area we will have drained will add 

 a territory as large as all France to the Stars 

 and Stripes. In the work of reclamation there 

 are opportunities for our new pioneers such as 

 their forefathers never dreamed of. 



