THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



333 



have been fully tilled by freeholders, little danger of 

 land monopoly will remain. 



This great meeting of practical irrigators should 

 give particular attention to this problem and others 

 of the same kind. You should, and I doubt not that 

 you will, give your effectual support to the officers of 

 the Government in making the Reclamation law suc- 

 cessful in all respects, and particularly in getting back 

 the original investment, so that the money may be 

 used again and again in the completion of other proj- 

 ects and thus in the general extension of prosperity in 

 the West. Until it has been proved that this great 

 investment of $40,000,000 in irrigation made by the 

 Government will be returning to the treasury, it is 



vigorous purpose to make every resource of the forest 

 reserves contribute in the highest degree to the perma- 

 nent prosperity of the people who depend upon them. 

 If ever the time should come when the western forests 

 are destroyed, there will disappear with them the pros- 

 perity of the stockman, the miner, the lumberman, 

 and the railroads, and, most important of all, the small 

 ranchman who cultivates his own land. I know that 

 you are with me in the intention to preserve the tim- 

 ber, the water, and the grass by using them fully, but 

 wisely and conservatively. We propose to do this 

 through the freest and most cordial co-operation be- 

 tween the Government and every man who is in sym- 

 pathy with this policy, the wisdom of which no man 



Hon. George E. Barstow, Barstow, Tex., Third Vice-President Fifteenth 

 National Irrigation Congress. 



useless to expect that the people of the country will 

 consider direct appropriations for the work. Let us 

 give the Reclamation Service a chance to utilize the 

 present investment a second time before discussing 

 such increase. I look forward with great confidence 

 to the result. 



By the side of the Reclamation Service there has 

 grown up another service of no less interest and value 

 to you of the West. This is the Forest Service, which 

 was created when the charge of the forest reserves 

 was transferred from the Interior Department to the 

 Department of Agriculture. The forest policy of the 

 administration, which the Forest Service is engaged 

 in carrying out, is based, as I have often said, on the 



who knows the facts can for a moment doubt. 



It is now less than two years since the Forest Ser- 

 vice was established. It had a great task before it to 

 create or reorganize the service on a hundred forest 

 reserves and to ascertain and meet the very different 

 local conditions and local needs all over the West. 

 This task is not finished, and of course it could not 

 have been finished in so short a time. But the work has 

 been carried forward with energy and intelligence, and 

 enough has been done to show how our forest policy 

 is working out. 



The result of first importance to you as irrigators 

 is this : The Forest Service has proved that forest fires 

 can be controlled, by controlling them. Only one-tenth 



