ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS. 31 



cations had been received. Formerly dams and other work for 

 water conservation and supply on creeks and rivers existed on 

 sufferance only, and this state of affairs had naturally a most 

 injurious effect on the development of the country. Although 

 the Water Rights Act has been little over a year in operation, 

 its influence in encouraging the construction of a better class of 

 work has already become apparent. 



The report of Colonel Home endorses the conclusion previously 

 arrived at by the Department, that the only New South Wales 

 rivers for which it is practicable to construct irrigation canals of 

 any considerable magnitude are the Murray and the Murrum- 

 bidgee. He considered that even in the cases of these rivers, 

 large storage reservoirs are required to insure sufficient supplies 

 of water. Colonel Home concurred in the practicability of the 

 proposed canal on the south side of the Murrumbidgee, and also 

 of the proposed canal from the river Murray at Bungowannah, 

 six miles below Albury, and he recommended that the former 

 project should be taken up first as its financial prospects appeared 

 the more promising. 



The Bourke Lock and Weir, which is the only work of its kind 

 in the Australian colonies, was tested under all ordinary conditions 

 during the past year, and proved perfectly satisfactory throughout. 

 The weir consists of a series of moveable shutters which are 

 dropped flat on the river bed when the river reaches navigation level 

 and are raised again when the falling river reaches this level. The 

 lock gates also are opened when the shutters are dropped, and 

 closed when the shutters are raised. In a flood the works are 

 entirely submerged, and as the river was widened at the weir level, 

 the waterway is actually slightly more than it was before the 

 works were constructed so that there is no acceleration of the 

 velocity. It was decided during the last Parliamentary Session, 

 that the question of locking the river Darling from Bourke to 

 Wilcannia should be referred to the Public Works Committee. 



Chemistry. — Mr. Hamlet, the Government Analyst, has supplied 

 me with the following information : — Recent advances in chemistry 



