20 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



soft and tender white sage. Quite frequently the green 

 mass of the yellow sage, with its amber colored seed 

 pockets, where beautiful yellow flowers have bloomed, 

 is met. The beautiful white snake flower, with its soft, 

 white petals and dozens of yellow stamens, and thick 

 green, hairy calyx; and the large ouse, with its long, 

 green, lilylike flower stem and its little white bulblike 

 flower and its long, green leaves springing out of the 

 central bulb, at once charm and delight the eye. And 

 over the barren floo'r everywhere is the curly grass and 

 tosslers grass, and the little low, white daisy, with its 

 matlike forms. As we descend the masses of yellow 

 brush and rabbit bushes and the little low deer brush 

 and the pretty little white pig brush are passed. Midst 

 rocky mass and canyon floor the path descends to the 

 valley. Truly the desert flora, as well as the fauna, is 

 rich and varied. 



Mountain and desert alike exert a fatal fascination 

 over the souls of men, compelling them with an irresist- 

 ible power to return to their mighty glaciers and snow 

 fields, or burning, desolate sands. "In the presence of 

 these vast spaces and all but unbounded outlook, the 

 hours hurry by with singular swiftness." No one has as 

 yet attempted to answer, in any detail, the psychological 

 effect on the personality of the vast desert, nor to ex- 

 plain that "expansion of soul which is the instant and 

 lasting reward." 



"I would walk the verdant valley where the salt waves 



wash the feet 

 Of the Wasatch. Gazing upward, where the sky and 



mountains meet. 

 Filled with awe and admiration I would kneel upon the 



strand, 

 In this mountain-walled treasury of the gods Utah." 



THE APPLICATION OF POWER TO FARM WORK. 



BY ELWOOD MEAD, 



THE IRRIGATION SITUATION. 



The Federal Government must show its hand plainly 

 in this State before the next legislature convenes in 

 January, 1907. This refers to the irrigation situation. 



If the Government fails to have dirt flying on one 

 or more big projects in this State by that time it will 

 be very apt to lose the opportunity of doing anything 

 for the people of Washington in the way of reclama- 

 tion work. If nothing is done within the period men- 

 tioned every corporation man in the State interested 

 in water rights will be singing the same tune, to-wit: 

 The Government had an opportunity and wouldn't do 

 anything; now let it get out of the way and give the 

 corporations a chance. 



That such an argument would have great weight 

 with the legislature it is useless to deny. More than 

 that, the patience of the people would by that time 

 be well-nigh exhausted and the masses, even in this 

 valley, would be very apt to conclude that reservoirs 

 and canals constructed by corporations would be very 

 much better than no reservoirs and no new canals at all. 

 Thus would the people be forced into the corporation 

 net. 



Those who made the struggle before the last legis- 

 lature to secure the passage of the so-called Government 

 bill well know what a fight it was to get it. Subter- 

 ranean influence bitterly opposed giving the National 

 Government the law demanded, and a goodly portion of 

 this kind of influence, it might be added in passing, 

 emanated right here at home. Yakima Democrat. 



Chief of Irrigation and Drainage Investigations, Office of Ex- 

 periment Stations. 



(Read before annual meeting of Manufacturers of Agricultural Imple- 

 ments.) 



Although agriculture is the oldest of human indus- 

 tries, its greatest improvement has been made in the last 

 hundred years. Up to the beginning of the Nineteenth 

 century men plowed as they did in the time of Pharoah 

 and threshed as they did in the days of Abraham. Prog- 

 ress in agriculture dates from the time when machinery 

 began to be substituted for hand labor, from the time 

 when it relieved the farm of the hardest tasks and gave 

 greater rewards for the hours of toil. We can hardly 

 realize the changes wrought by the long list of agricul- 

 tural machines and implements which American in- 

 genuity has brought forth, nor .what this continent 

 would be like if we still cut grain with a sickle and 

 threshed it with a flail. 



Machinery enables us to grow the leading farm 

 products with one-fifth the labor required fifty 'years 

 ago. In that time, the wages of farm laborers have 

 more than doubled, yet the cost of producing crops has 

 been lowered one-half and the quality greatly improved. 

 Striking as are these statistics, they give no adequate 

 conception of what agricultural machinery has done for 

 the development of this nation, because its material ben- 

 efits have been more than equalled by the social and in- 

 tellectual gain which has come by relieving farmers 

 from deadening toil. In a republic, the quality of the 

 man is of as much importance as what he earns, and 

 while we can not measure by percentage what machinery 

 has done for the intellectual development of the farmer, 

 we know that swinging a hoe does not stimulate thought 

 like operating the lever of a steam thresher. 



We need not undervalue the great achievements of 

 the pioneer farmers to realize how much greater are the 

 requirements of today. The courage, intelligence and 

 skill with which our forefathers used their primitive 

 tools, and the success they won, is a proud heritage. 

 But their tools and their methods will not answer now. 

 In the rapid series of changes wrought by the progress 

 of invention the old tools have disappeared almost as 

 completely as the Indian and buffalo. Gone also is the 

 skill and dexterity with which the scythe, the hoe, and 

 the ax were used. The trouble we now labor under 

 is that the evolution of farm machinery has gone on so 

 rapidly that it has outstripped the farm laborer's 

 growth in mechanical skill. He has forgotten the old 

 methods and not fully mastered the new. 



The American farmer uses power machines because 

 he can not afford hand labor. It is too scarce and 

 costly and he is now facing certain tendencies which 

 make his success more dependent on the economics of 

 power than ever before. Other factors which enter into 

 the cost of producing crops all tend to an increase. 

 There is no more cheap fertile public land. The price 

 of land is rising; so is the outlay for maintaining its 

 fertility. Farm labor was never so scarce nor wages 

 so high as now. The American farmer has to compete 

 with the foreign farmer in prices he gets for his produce, 

 and with the American railroad, mine and factory in 



