123 



at the sources of certain navigable streams to be selected by the 

 Geological Survey with a view to determining the practicability 

 of thus improving and protecting the streams for federal purposes. 

 I think a moderate expenditure for each year for this purpose for 

 a period of five or ten years would be of the utmost benefit in the 

 development of our forestry system." 



Conservation of Soils : " In considering the conservation of the 

 natural resources of the country, the feature that transcends all 

 others, including woods, waters, minerals, is the soil of the coun- 

 try. It is incumbent upon the government to foster by all avail- 

 able means the resources of the country that produce the food 

 of the people. To this end the conservation of the soils of the 

 country should be cared for with all means at the government's 

 disposal. Their productive powers should have the attention of 

 our scientists, that we may conserve the new soils, improve the 

 old soils, drain wet soils, ditch swamp soils, levee river overflow 

 soils, grow trees on thin soils, pasture hillside soils, rotate crops 

 on all soils, discover methods for cropping dry land soils, find 

 grasses and legumes for all soils, feed grains and mill feeds on 

 the farms where they originate, that the soils from which they 

 come may be enriched. 



" A work of the utmost importance to inform and instruct the 

 public on this chief branch of the conservation of our resources 

 is being carried on successfully in the Department of Agricul- 

 ture ; but it ought not to escape public attention that state action 

 in addition to that of the Department of Agriculture (as, for in- 

 stance, in the drainage of swamp lands) is essential to the best 

 treatment of the soils in the manner above indicated. 



" The act by which, in semi-arid parts of the public domain, the 

 area of the homestead has been enlarged from i6o to 320 acres 

 has resulted most beneficially in the extension of " dry farming ", 

 and in the demonstration which has been made of the possibility, 

 through a variation in the character and mode of culture, of rais- 

 ing substantial crops without the presence of such a supply of 

 water as has been heretofore thought to be necessary for 

 agriculture." 



Arid Land Irrigation : " But there are millions of acres of com- 



