X PREFACE 



must rest. Crop or soil treatments which are not con- 

 nected directly with the use of water are not discussed or 

 are greatly subordinated. The various aspects of the 

 complex art of irrigation agricultural, economic, social 

 and legal will some day receive separate and special 

 treatment; in this volume one line of thought only has 

 been followed the correct use of water in irrigation. 



The aim of this book is to furnish to students and 

 intelligent farmers a modern view of the principles of 

 irrigation practice. Simple language has been used and 

 unnecessary technical terms have been avoided. Obvious 

 matters, and those which vary with local conditions and 

 must therefore be learned by experience, have been 

 eliminated. The beginner in irrigation has been kept in 

 mind; but the book is essentially a manual for those who, 

 whether in arid or humid climates, having cast their lots 

 with irrigation, desire mastery of their work by an intel- 

 ligent comprehension of the natural laws involved in 

 irrigation-farming. The actual handling of water can be 

 learned only by experience that is the beginner's heavy 

 lesson; the refinements of irrigation, by which its success 

 at last is measured, come later, and are unknown to 

 many. The man who lives year after year under the 

 ditch, and raises his family there, needs as much if not 

 more help than the pioneer whose chief sorrow is the 

 aggravating self-will of the water as it flows over the 

 newly broken land. 



Some subjects have been touched on lightly in this 

 volume because they are more fully developed in the 

 author's book on ''Dry-Farming." In fact, that book 

 and this one are a continued study of the water factor in 

 agriculture perhaps the most important of the physical 

 factors. Schools of agriculture, whether in arid or humid 



