262 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



The evidence is accumulating that certain 

 An Ertip persons who are endeavoring to divert the 

 tion Not irrigation law of Congress from its bene- 

 Unlikely. ficial purpose to provide homes for Amer- 

 ican citizens, actual homeseekers, into a 

 means of private speculation, will soon be brought up 

 with a round turn by a power that will show them little 

 mercy when the facts are laid before it. 



We know that scant ceremony has been shown 

 those engaged in various larger and smaller swindles 

 in the Postoffice Department, though that concerned 

 only the Government directly and the people indirectly, 

 and we feel assured that when it comes to scheming 

 against the people directly to take from them what is 

 for their benefit, for the public welfare, the hand 

 will be laid upon them without distinction as to dig- 

 nity, ill gotten wealth, or political influence. 



Does any one suppose that a man like President 

 Roosevelt, whose heart and soul are wrapped up in the 

 welfare of the people of this country, is racing through 

 the land blindfolded? Or that he is not taking notes 

 of conditions wherever he goes to verify the manifold 

 complaints that have been laid before him? This man 

 we have for President is not a political ward striker, 

 who closes his eyes to the deeds of those he has in his 

 employ, or wink at the tricks of his henchman. He is 

 a man who has openly declared that he is the President 

 of the people of the United States, and not the leader of 

 any clique, gang or combination of appointees, who can 

 set at naught the spirit of our laws and expect to escape 

 punishment. 



The Romans had a saying to the effect that "whom 

 the gods would destroy they first make mad," the plain 

 meaning of which is that men pursuing a .crooked path 

 are so mad as to imagine they can continue in it with 

 impunity and involve themselves in such a labyrinth of 

 wickedness that all trace of them will be concealed from 

 the eye of the arenger. They are mad to dream that 

 their iniquities may not be laid bare, their willful tam- 

 pering with law, justice and right undetected. 



The plain meaning and intent of this writing is 

 that there are those who are at present ruling the sub- 

 ordinate powers of the Government for their private 

 gain; that a combination exists to select for themselves 

 the choicest locations under the irrigation law and leave 

 the remnants, the "culls," for the people, who believed 

 the President to be speaking in good faith when he said 

 that law was for the benefit of actual, bona fide home- 

 seekers and not for a gang of speculators, composed 

 of Government officials led by private adventurers, 

 whose whole occupation consists in working against the 

 intent of the President, the intent of Congress, and 

 making both belie their words. 



Such is the opinion of the people who are not blind 

 to the corrupt influences creeping into the manage- 

 ment of the machinery conducting the operations under 



that irrigation law, and such soon will be the opinion 

 of the power, who can crush out the pernicious influence 

 when the accumulated evidence shall have been laid be- 

 fore it. 



We go so far as to say that even if President 

 Roosevelt should endanger his chances for election, he 

 would not hesitate to oust summarily these derelict 

 officials who openly boast that their influence is suffi- 

 cient to mar his chances if he dare interfere with them. 



This is not a note of warning to any one impli- 

 cated. It is notice to a long suffering and defrauded 

 people that the Aegean stable in and behind the Geolog- 

 ical Survey will as surely be cleaned and fumigated as 

 that you read this prophecy" in THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



The far western farmer, necessarily re- 

 The Pump sourcesful from the very nature of his 

 as a Farm surroundings, is rapidly developing the 

 Factor. great bodies of water whose outlets can 



not be utilized for surface irrigation. 



The modern pump is rapidly becoming an 

 important factor in developing large sections of the 

 arid West. It has long been known that large sheets 

 of underground water exist in many sections where 

 the surface, presents nothing but apparently hopeless 

 problems to the agriculturist. It is only within the 

 last few years that the ingenuity of mechnical engineers 

 has solved an easy and inexpensive way of raising this 

 water to the surface and distributing it over the thirsty 

 land to make it bloom and blossom as the rose. 



In some of these parched deserts wells sunk to the 

 depth of two or three hundred feet bring great gush- 

 ing streams to the surface whose flow is as constant 

 and regular as the rivers and streams of the mountains 

 themselves. In many places, however, the water lies 

 too near the surface to give a self-raising force and 

 where this condition exists the modern pump is brought 

 into use. Shafts are sunk to the water body ; the pump 

 is put into operation and the stream rises to the surface 

 and instantly reclaims land that has been fit for nothing 

 but sage brush and the home of the jack rabbit for 

 centuries. 



The Division of Engineering and Drainage of the 

 Department of Agriculture is doing great work in edu- 

 cating the people of the West how to take advantage of 

 these underground bodies of water and utilize them for 

 their benefit. Careful surveys are made showing the 

 exact locations and boundaries of these underground 

 lakes and streams, and the seeker after water may sink 

 his well or his shaft with the certainty of finding water 

 without the tedious and expensive process of haphazard 

 experiment. In the Pecos Valley in New Mexico along 

 the line of the Sante Fe railway, in Utah, along the 

 line of the Union Pacific, and in certain sections of 

 North and South Dakota, traversed by the Northern 

 Pacific and Great Northern railways, in Southern Cali- 



