1886.] Van WyJi's Vlei Reservoir. 221 



the terrible droughts which are so frequent in the back country, and 

 which sometimes last for years, reducing well-to-do farmers to a state 

 of bankruptcy. Often and often are they obliged to shut up their 

 houses, collect what stock is left to them, and trek with their wives 

 and families to distant parts of the country in search of veldt and 

 water, not knowing when they again can return to their homes. 



How then can it be expected that people, living in this hand-to- 

 mouth manner, are able to pay for expensive surveys and construct 

 proper and substantial works ? It is entirely out of their power, and 

 the most they can do is to construct, with what labour they have 

 about the farm, a dam to hold as much water as possible, adding to it 

 as time and opportunity permit. Often a heavy storm destroys all 

 their labour, before the work is properly finished. 



An Irrigation Act was passed a few years ago, authorising the loan 

 of money, on easy terms, to enable farmers to construct dams, and 

 other works, for irrigation purposes, and many took advantage of it, 

 but a great deal has yet to be done to give effectual assistance to the 

 poorer class of farmers. 



The Dutch farmer, as a rule, adheres tenaciously to the methods 

 used by his forefathers, in dam making and farming, but many are 

 now appreciating the use of such scientific appliances as siphons, 

 turbines, and pulsometer or other pumps for irrigation. 



When he sees lands which are regularly irrigated, thriving and 

 producing all kinds of crops and grain, whilst his own are dried and 

 parched with drought, he naturally wishes to possess the like, and 

 I have no doubt that, in course of time, large tracts of fine land 

 which now only afford a precarious support to a few sheep and goats 

 will be made to produce an abundant supply of grain and other 

 produce, the most of which, at the present time, has to be imported 

 at a great cost. 



Those who have travelled much in the Karroo cannot have failed 

 to observe that wherever a farmer has been able to irrigate, the 

 luxuriant vegetation appears, to the eye, wearied by miles and miles 

 of dry and Stunted bushes and with nothing to vary the monotonous 

 appearance of the country, to be a veritable oasis in the desert. 

 There is no reason why these patches of cultivation should not be 

 more numerous and extensive than they are at present, for on most 

 farms there are sites more or less favourable for storing the rain 

 which falls so seldom, and which should in consequence be preserved 

 .as much as possible, to meet the demands in time of drought. 



G3 



