278 ALFALFA FARMING IN AMERICA. 
apart from his fellow men, he learned independence, 
nor ever developed much of the spirit of interde- 
pendence that came with the man living where ir- 
rigation was practiced. 
After all, in the long run, the forest-dweller over- 
threw the civilizations developed by irrigation, and 
now in the marvelous shifting of peoples of these 
frantic days we find Dane and Norwegian, Scot and 
Yankee, all jostling each other in the arid West, 
learning the ancient and honorable art of guiding 
water over a thirsty land, learning to redeem des- 
erts, to replace sage brush with alfalfa, cactus flow- 
ers with roses; to make grapes grow where thorns 
were yesterday. . 
Fertility of Irrigated Lands.—Irrigated lands 
have all the advantages after all, for they are so 
fertile. Lands where rain falls have been leached 
for centuries of their lime, of their potash, of their 
phosphorus. Desert lands have all their mineral 
wealth yet untouched. No matter if they look gray 
and infertile, just moisten them, sow the seed, and 
watch the miracle unfold. Soon overspreads the 
arid dusty plain a tender green. Little shining 
streams course between furrows, the hard clods melt, 
the earth gives up of its treasures, the green deepens, 
thickens. A meadow has come; it blooms, bees hum, 
butterflies play in the sunlight, humming birds seek 
the nectar of the bloom, along the cool depths of the 
placid canal trees spring up, a little house is soon 
hidden with fruit trees, alfalfa stacks hide the corral, 
the desert is forgotten, 
