150 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



BROUGHT BY THE POSTMAN. 



Letters From Correspondents Who Want to Know Where They 

 Can Obtain Many Things. 



CHICAGO, Feb. 8, 1904. To THE EDITOR OF THE IRRIGATION 

 AGE: These are pre-eminently days of reform. Many of 

 the reforms are in the wrong direction, as witness the de- 

 velopment of municipal governments on the reformers' meth- 

 ods. Nearly all are based on the socialistic plan where the 

 wastefulness of public management is substituted for the more 

 careful and satisfactory methods of individualism. All radical 

 changes are looked upon as reforms and he who stops to 

 discuss the value of the conditions that we will arrive at 

 under these methods as compared with that from which we 

 started, is looked upon as a fossil and belonging to the 

 Silurian period. 



We have now arrived at that period when the land laws 

 are to be swept away, excepting the original homestead act. 

 shorn of its commutation clause. Private ownership of tim- 

 ber lands is to be shut out and the whole timber interests 

 of the country are to be managed by a bureau at Washing- 

 ton. Lincoln has well said that "You can fool some of the 

 people all of the time, and all the the people some of the 

 time, but not all the people all of the time." It is beginning 

 to look as though there is an exception to this rule which 

 comes from applying the methods of misinterpretation and 

 exaggeration. The public has been led to believe that the 

 amount of frauds in the administration of these land laws 

 has been so great and so destructive to the interests of the 

 public that the repeal of the land laws has become a neces- 

 sity, to save the remaining timber lands from being wasted 

 and destroyed. And, in order to save some remnants for 

 future generations and to apply proper forestry methods to 

 the great timber reservations, an army of foresters and assist- 

 ants must be placed in charge of the remaining timber to 

 secure the application of right methods of forestry. 



This is built upon the presumption that individuals who 

 own the timber lands will not make as good use of the timber 

 standing, will not have it cut as carefully or apply as good 

 forestry methods in reproduction as will be done by this army 

 of Government employees. This presumption is based upon 

 a misunderstanding of human nature and the methods of 

 competitive business life. Let our legislators look over the 

 methods employed by the Government in the past twenty years 

 in supervising the lumber on the reservations in Minnesota, 

 and trace out in detail the amount of value derived by the 

 public from these reserves in comparison to that which has 

 come from lands held by private owners and then consider 

 the application of this method of public ownership and admin- 

 istration as compared with private, of the timber lands of the 

 Coast states, where the great timber areas will be for a per- 

 petual forest supply and particularly apply this to the scat- 

 tered pieces of land that could be taken up -under the timber 

 and stone act and the exchange clause of the forest reserve 

 act or the commutation clause of the homestead act, and see 

 how immensely more wasteful the public methods will be 

 as against the more careful ones of private ownership, into 

 whose hands these lands would fall through the agency of the 

 citizens' locations under these acts. 



When these scattered pieces and tracts of land are per- 

 petually held away from location and taxation and the great 

 forest reservations are taken out of the reach of the lumber- 

 mens' operations, not only will there be extra high prices on 

 lumber, but the timber will be wasted in miscellaneous fron- 

 tier denuding processes, mostly carried on by individuals or 

 by the agency of fire. Will the forestry department or mem- 

 bers of Congress claim that these scattered pieces, tracts and 

 portions of timber land that lie outside of the forest reser- 

 vations will be more useful to the people of this country where 

 the individual is interested in taking care of it, making 

 the best use of the timber, so as to get the most out of the 

 land as against placing it in the public hands where the tim- 

 ber is so scattering that it will be absolutely impossible to 

 look after it without expending more money than the Gov- 

 ernment will ever be able to get out of the land or timber. 

 It is very difficult for individuals who own scattered tracts 

 of land to prevent waste and destruction and still more so 

 on the part of Government officials, who only travel through 

 the country occasionally, even though there be large numbers 

 of them in the field. 



The basis of all this is the great frauds that have been 

 committed mostly under the timber and stone act. Persons 



who are more familiar with the frontier land business and 

 who have been concerned in it for years are apprised of the 

 fact that not five per cent of the frauds that have been claimed 

 have been committed. Not only no such wholesale frauds 

 that have been so broad, persistently repeated, but only a 

 small fraction of the amount claimed. And after repeated 

 and repeated and repeated statements of great wholesale 

 frauds that are just being unearthed, and without any results 

 ever showing up excepting an isolated case here and there 

 it would seem to be time that we cease to legislate on such 

 special pleas that have been made with entirely insufficient 

 basis to rest upon. There are other reasons, and political 

 ones, why the opposition would be glad to have the Re- 

 publicans repeal these laws before the next election. The 

 loss of Washington, Oregon and California may make the 

 turning point in the Presidential and Congressional majorities. 



H. B. WEBSTER. 



SPOKANE, WASH., Feb. 12. EDITOR THE IRRIGATION AGE: 

 I own some land over in Montana which must be irrigated 

 by pumping. I am anxious to learn what is being done else- 

 where in this particular line. I find nothing in the Government 

 publications which is of any particular value. Most other re- 

 ports I have seen are so general in the statements given that 

 my purpose is not served. I am anxious, therefore, to get the 

 facts in detail about a few pumping plants where water is 

 lifted over fifty feet in height. I want such facts as will 

 cover capacity of pump, where manufactured, character of 

 pumps, number of cubic feet of water for twenty-four hours, 

 size of pipes, height water is lifted, number of acres covered, 

 cost of fuel, cost of labor, cost of plant, and such other facts in 

 detail as a man on the ground naturally would seek. 



Anything you can do for me will be appreciated. I 

 remain. Very respectfully yours. 



CHAS. C. REEDER. 



ST. ANTHONY PARK, MINN., Feb. 6. EDITOR IRRIGATION 

 AGE: Will you please have sent me by return mail the ad- 

 dresses of all the drain tile manufacturers you know in 

 Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa and Illinois, and greatly oblige. 

 Very truly yours, W. M. HAYS. 



ST. GEORGE'S INDIAN SCHOOL, LYTTON, B. C., Feb. 4. 

 EDITOR THE IRRIGATION AGE: Recently I wrote to the P. & 

 O. Company, stating that the implements used here for 

 marking out irrigation lines seemed very primitive and asking 

 whether they had any machine for that purpose. They re- 

 plied that they had not and advised me to write to the 

 IRRIGATION AGE. Could you please send me a sample copy 

 and if you have an old number with an illustration of such 

 an implement required I shall be much obliged to you. 

 Yours truly, GEO, DITCHAM. 



OAKVILLE, TEX., Feb. 13. EDITOR IRRIGATION ACE: Mr. 

 James Duffy, of San Antonio, sent me your letter of De- 

 cember 1 to him. in which' you said that for $10.00 you would 

 send a very nice selection of books on irrigation and drain- 

 age, and in which you say that you included in that list F. 

 H. Newell's work on irrigation at $2, so I take it that for 

 $8 you would send the collection suggested, and I herewith 

 hand you check for $8 on Frost's National Bank, San An- 

 tonio, for which send me the selection omitting Newell's 

 work on irrigation which I have. 



I own a 60.000-acre ranch through which the Nueces 

 River runs and I am just commencing to irrigate it on the 

 river and I desire all the information I can get on the methods 

 of transmitting water most economically, which at present 

 I am arranging to pump from the Nueces River on black 

 sandy loam which will eat up a great deal of water, hence 

 my desire to economize the use of water as much as possible. 



Now that you understand my situation and inexperience 

 if in addition to the list you intended for Mr. Duffy you 

 know of any other books or magazines which will aid me, 

 you will nlease send them along, provided, of course, that 

 you make the lowest rate obtainable on those publications and 

 on receipt of same with bill I will remit you any balance that 

 may be due. 



Thanking you in advance for your prompt kindness I beg 

 to remain. Very truly yours, C. F. SIMMONS. 



