76 ESSAY ON IRRIGATION. 



impoverished by naked exposure to heat and wind, and washing 

 by water that runs off and is lost, than it is by producing abun- 

 dant crops. 



In the present state of population, nothing more could be 

 expected or desired than that every farmer should make use of 

 such means as the small streams in his vicinity may afford ; but 

 in a densely peopled country, like Egypt in former ages, or 

 China at present, it should doubtless be one of the first enter- 

 prises of a good government, to take our large rivers above their 

 falls and turn them off into canals for the benefit of agriculture. 



JEREMIAH SPOFFORD. 



