I04 



FORESTRY AND IRRIGATION. 



March, 



example, a man may secure control of a 

 spring or locality where water might be 

 held to irrigate 10,000 acres. He holds 

 this for his cattle or for raising forage. 

 He has not the means to conserve the 

 water, nor could he do this profitably. 

 It is of no particular interest to him 

 whether 50 or 100 families or more might 

 make homes upon the vacant land ad- 

 joining. If he could build the works, 

 if he could get the people there, and if 

 having them there he could exercise gov- 

 ernmental control over them, he could 

 make a fortune; but he cannot do it, and 

 so these public lands around him lie idle. 



There are thousands of such instances. 

 In one way or another control of the 

 situation is rapidly passing away from 

 the people, and vested rights are grow- 

 ing up. This absence of wise control, 

 if continued, must result in the arid 

 West remaining thinly populated, in- 

 stead of furnishing opportunities for 

 millions of people. Nothing less than 

 prompt action on the part of Congress 

 can prevent this calamity. 



The construction of works of reclama- 

 tion by the government does not neces- 

 sarily involve the actual irrigation of the 

 land by the government. By sa^ing 

 the floods or by constructing large diver- 

 sion works, taking water from a river 

 and turning it over a divide, it becomes 

 possible for the settlers to build their 

 own distributing systems in the same 

 way that the pioneers have done. 



The people who originally came to 

 the arid West found a scanty but widely 

 distributed water supply, which they 

 proceeded to utilize. This they have 

 done up to the limit of the available 

 sources. There are other vast quantities 

 of water, however, which are beyond the 

 reach of settlers, and cannot be used 

 until regulated or conserved. It is im- 

 possible for a home-seeker to go out 

 upon the desert and, unaided or by co- 

 operation, build great reservoirs such as 

 are constructed in other countries by 

 the government. 



For several years past our trade with 

 foreign countries has been phenomenal. 

 This is especiall}^ true as respects our 

 exports. First we tempted the foreign 

 appetite with our bread foods, and soon 

 the whole world began to bu)-. Then 



we sent across the seas the samples of 

 our mechanical skill. Orders have been 

 pouring in for our manufactured goods, 

 until now our modern railway equip- 

 ments, our electrical appliances, our 

 steel bridges, our farm machiner3% and 

 a hundred other mechanical appliances, 

 the product of American mills and fac- 

 tories, are to be found in successful use 

 around the globe. 



The demand has been so stupen- 

 dously great that we are justified in paus- 

 ing to ask if it is to continue indefinitely. 

 The answer is that ultimately there 

 must be a limit to the ability of foreign 

 countries to buy ; that in the very na- 

 ture of things the demand cannot out- 

 run the supply. Indeed, there are evi- 

 dences that the manufacturer must soon 

 turn again to the good old home market 

 if he would keep his enlarged factories 

 in operation When he does, he may 

 not find the home market ready to take 

 all his surplus products. Reveling in 

 the saturnalia of trade with foreign 

 countries covering the past half dozen 

 3-ears, he may have overlooked the 

 prime duty of urging an important line 

 of development, namely, the expansion 

 of domestic resources. He will find the 

 arid region of his own country un- 

 claimed. He will find the mountain 

 torrents going to waste, Congress hav- 

 ing failed to authorize their utilization 

 in the interest of home-building. He 

 will find a multitude of men crowding 

 the great cities who should be adding 

 wealth to the nation and bettering their 

 own condition by tilling the soil. 



This presents but one of several ne- 

 glected opportunities. Thebestindusrty 

 is home industry. The best market is 

 the home market. The most substan- 

 tial and enduring wealth is that wealth 

 which is permanently attached to the 

 nation as a result of domestic enterprise. 

 The foreign market is in many waj^s a 

 transitory' thing. We control it to-day ; 

 to-morrow it may be lost to us. We 

 put our highest hopes in it with the 

 ever-present danger of having them 

 shattered. A policy of self-reliance is 

 the best policy with nations as with 

 men. It is the pursuit of this policy 

 that has brought us greatness as a na- 

 tion and as a people. 



