.The; HlS'tORY O^ IRRIGATION. II 



origin have been found on the Colorado river, and 

 parts of them have been adapted to the modern canals. 

 At the Casa Grande and in the Salt River valley of 

 Southern Arizona these canals may still be seen. 

 Thirty-five years ago an engineer at field work near 

 Riverside, California, was running the level for a 

 proposed ditch. He could not establish the grade 

 satisfactorily, so he went again to the stream and 

 reconnoitered for a new start. He was surprised to 

 find an old acequia — so old, in fadl, that its banks were 

 scarcely discernible — and by carefully following its 

 course he was still more astonished to discover that it 

 had brought him to his original objecftive point, and 

 on these lines the new canal was laid. The grade was 

 all that could have been wished for. 



Among the old irrigation works are those in the 

 vicinity of San Antonio, Teij:as, begun under the direc- 

 tion of the Spanish padres about 171 5. With the 

 eredtion of the Spanish missions began the cultivation 

 of the soil in Southwestern Texas. According to local 

 tradition the worthy padres were expert in rounding 

 up the unfortunate natives and getting an unlimited 

 amount of work out of them in the construdlion of 

 mission buildings and irrigating ditches. The pay for 

 services rendered was usually bestowed in the form of 

 religious instrudlion, administered willy-nilly, and 

 occasionally augmented by an extra inquisition, if the 

 forced piety and humility did not agree well with the 

 unwilling convert. 



The pioneer Mormons who settled in the fertile 

 Salt Lake valley in 1847 saw the necessity of irriga- 

 tion, and to their untiring efforts and attendant success 



