240 H. G. McKINNEY. 



difficult to avoid this course. The requirements of settlement 

 demand attention, and these requirements in times of drought are 

 often of an urgent nature, so that the quickest course of procedure 

 has to be accepted as the best course. It is beyond the province 

 of this paper to discuss the question as to how the difficulties 

 which are liable to arise in this way could be best avoided; but it 

 may be pointed out that much light may be thrown on the subject 

 by examination of the methods which have been adopted elsewhere 

 under similar conditions. 



Necessity for storage reservoirs on all western rivers. — While the 

 Murray and the Murrumbidgee require to have their summer 

 discharge supplemented in order to enable them to give regular 

 supplies of water to large irrigation canals, the conditions of all 

 the other western rivers are such as to necessitate storage reservoirs 

 to prevent their flow from stopping altogether, as it occasionally 

 does for considerable periods. 



Lachlan, Macquarie, and Gwydir Riper s — drainage project for 

 the Gwydir Marshes. — The Lachlan, the Macquarie, and the 

 Gwydir are in several important respects similar in their conditions. 

 The flow in all of them is very irregular, they all divide into a 

 number of channels from which their waters spread out over large 

 areas of land, and in sill three cases no part of their waters reaches 

 the ocean except in high floods. The overflow of the Lachlan and 

 of the Macquarie benefits extensive areas, and converts what 

 would otherwise be a very dry district into valuable pasture land. 

 The Gwydir waters similarly benefit extensive areas, but in a 

 series of wet years the accumulation of water in what is known 

 as "The Watercourse Country" is so great as to make much of 

 the land temporarily useless. Hence in the case of this river 

 there has been a demand for drainage works, and an extensive 

 scheme was prepared on this account some years ago. The area 

 of the land which is liable to be rendered useless for several years 

 together is nearly half a million acres. The estimated cost of the 

 necessary main drainage works was ,£19,000, and the estimated 

 increase in the capital value of the land to be benefited was £125,000 



