106 WATER SUPPLY IN THE INTERIOR OF NEW SOUTH WALES. 
across the plains, is far too expensive, unless we had a vast, half- 
starved population like that of India, or China, with only the bare 
means of subsistence, living from day to day in the imminent fear 
thing of almost annual occurrence. With excavated tanks the 
advantages are, first,—the choice of position is much more exten- 
sive than with any other method of obtaining water in the western 
country, and the position of a watering-place with reference to the 
surrounding country may make it of double or treble the value 
which it would otherwise have. Second, there is no danger from 
floods of the watering-place being destroyed at a time when plenty 
ith d i 
of certainty, whether it will pay to water and stock it or not; 
having to travel more than 3 miles back with only the same 
amount of food available, 50 per cent. more sheep could be de 
tured in the interior of New South Wales. A little consideration 
will show with mathematical certainty that this must be 
‘There is only a certain fixed quantity of force or life-sustaining 
power in the food available, and if in addition to sustaining the 
