210 
The results obtained gave a minimum outflow of 1,525 cubic feet per 
second, or, expressed in other words, of 34,000,000 imperial gailons per 
hour. Shoshone, Lewis, and Heart Lakes poured into Snake River 104 
eubie feet per second. With few exceptions all the principal rivers 
leaving the Park were gauged and the discharge from the others care- 
fully estimated, taking as a basis the number of square miles contained 
in the drainage basin and the flow of the streams, The results give 
what may be considered as approximately the minimum discharge from 
the Park—a volume of water equal to 1 cubic foot per second per square 
mile over an area somewhat more than 4,000 square miles; or as Dr. 
Hallock, of the U.S. Geological Survey, whosupervised the gauging of the 
streams, has stated it, ‘an amount of water which vould make a river 
5 feet deep and 190 feet wide, with a current of 3 miles per hour.” For 
a region bordering on the arid plains to the eastward this is certainly 
an excessive amount. | 
According to Humphreys and Abbott, the mean annual discharge 
from the Mississippi River at its mouth amounts to 675,000 cubie feet 
per second from a drainage basin of 1,147,000 square miles. This gives 
.53 cubie feet per second per square mile, or a trifle more than one half 
the minimum estimate for the Yellowstone Park country. Surely is it 
not one of the treasures of the nation, to be carefully guarded in every 
possible way ? 
If the broad valley of the Lower Yellowstone from Glendive to Liv- 
ingston is ever to be occupied by an agricultural population, they will 
at no distant day need all the water flowing from the sources of the 
river for purposes of irrigation. In the Gallatin Valley, the finest 
wheat region in Montana, the hard-working farmers are already quar- 
relling over the distribution of the water running into their inadequately 
supplied irrigating ditches, while the equally industrious wood-chopper 
is busily cutting away the timber from the headwaters of the streams 
in the mountains. 
In another way this broad forest-protected reservoir is singularly 
well situated to be of incalculable service to the nation. Throughout 
the summer the prevailing dry winds from the west in their passage 
across this moist mountainous region absorb immense quantities of water 
ready under favorable conditions to be again precipitated over the 
agricultural and grazing lands to the eastward. In camping near tim- 
ber line for weeks at atime, I have never failed to be impressed with the 
absorbing powers of these winds, the effect of which may be seen upon 
the snow fields any hot summer day. The melting of the snow and the 
running down of the water frequently appears inconsiderable as com- 
pared with the absorbing power of the hot, thirsty winds. Where all 
the available lands on the Great Plains is being taken up for settlement 
by a rapidly advancing civilization, the economic distribution of the 
Park waters is a question of the utmost importance to the nation. 
It is proposed to extend the boundaries of the Yellowstone Park to 

