THE USE OF SIPHONS. 55 



bank through a pipe, thus furnishing motive-power to run 

 the ram, which sends water up to the house." 



Conveying Water by Siphon, Conveying water over a 

 hill to a point of delivery on the other side which is lower 

 than the supply point is a simple operation and one which 

 might be more generally employed than it is. Siphons 

 are sometimes made of pipes of considerable diameter 

 where the supply is large. Such devices are vastly cheaper 

 than tunneling. It is even on record that a fruit grower 

 put in quite an expensive pumping plant to force water 

 over a hill to his orchard on the other side and was sur- 

 prised to find that the water ran when the pump was not 

 in motion. He had not figured that the delivery point 

 was lower than the supply point, but so it was. In the 

 case of conveying water from rivers to leveed lands below 

 the stream, the siphon is cheaper than a flood-gate and 

 safer, and has the advantage of being portable. 



FARM AND GARDEN RESERVOIRS. 

 For the construction of a dam to restrain the water of 

 a creek it is always wisest for the man who has had no 

 experience in such work to secure the advice of an expert. 

 Fortunately such men are very abundant in California, 

 as dam building has been a profession of Californians ever 

 since early mining days. The making of water-tight dams 

 on a small scale is not necessarily a very expensive opera- 

 tion, but it is liable to become so if not done properly. An 

 experienced man can give suggestions as to the location 

 of the work in view of the natural conditions and the use 

 to be made of the water, the character of natural banks 

 or bottom which it is designed to use and the best mate- 

 rials at hand for building, as well as the proper form of 

 the construction for safety and efficiency in connection 

 with economical completion of the job. Expert advice is 

 especially necessary where dams are to be built for closing 

 natural waterways, for such efforts involve the handling 

 of volumes of storm water which a farmer may have little 

 conception of, though he may have grown up on the site. 



