1166 
before 3000 B. C. About 3500 B. C. would 
certainly be conservative. There is an 
ancient document called the ‘Laws of 
Hammurabi’ which contains a section on 
irrigation, and reads as follows: 
“Tf any one is too lazy to keep his 
dikes in order and fails to do so, and if 
a breach is made in his dike and fields 
are flooded with water, the man in whose 
dike the breach was opened shall replace 
the grain which he has destroyed. If he 
is not able to replace the grain, he and 
his property shall be sold and the people 
whose grain the water carried off shall 
share the proceeds.’ 
“If any one opens his irrigating canals 
to let in water, but is careless and the 
water floods the field of his neighbor, he 
shall measure out grain to the latter in 
proportion to the yield of the neighbor- 
ing field.” This document dates from 
2340 B. C., and indicates that irrigation 
was under the control of the government 
at that date. 
Sargon left a tablet about 3800 B. C. 
which relates to the story of his boyhood 
as follows: “I am Sargon the mighty 
king. My mother, of noble race, cone ived 
me and bore me in secret. She put me 
in a basket of Sur and closed up the 
openings with bitumen. She cast me into 
the river. The river carried me along to 
Akki, the irrigator. Akki, the irrigator, 
took me up. Akki, the irrigator, reared 
me up to boyhood. Akki, the irrigator, 
made me a@ gardener.” (McCurdy, His- 
tory-Prophecy and the Monuments.) 
It was doubtless the system of irriga- 
tion in use in Babylonia to which the 
plaintive song of the Hebrews referred 
when they said: “By the rivers (irri- 
gating ditches) of Babylon, there we sat 
dowh, yea we wept when we remembered 
Zion.” 
Early Irrigation In America 
Irrigation was practiced in prehistoric 
times by the town-building Pueblo In- 
dian tribes inhabiting portions of New 
Mexico and Arizona. The descendants of 
these tribes still utilize some of the lands 
which were tilled by irrigation at the 
time when the Spaniards first came from 
the south and practiced many of the 
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF PRACTICAL HORTICULTURE 
primitive customs of their ancestors The 
early missionaries of the Pacific coast 
also used the same customs (learned from 
these Indians), and 1n Southern Califor- 
nia particularly are to be found the ruins 
of substantial dams and headworks built 
by Indian labor. The Mexicans, of mixed 
Spanish and Indian origin, gradually ex- 
tending their settlements from the south, 
through necessity practiced irrigation. 
There are said to be ditches in Arizona 
and New Mexico, one of which is buried 
50 feet beneath the present surface of the 
soil. 
The Mormons Irrigate 
The first irrigation practiced in the 
United States by English-speaking people 
was by the Mormons near Salt Lake, in 
Utah. Brigham Young, their leader, was 
a man of vision, imagination and great 
ability. Whether from necessity, or from 
inventive genius, he succeeded in turn- 
ing the waters of the little canyons and 
streams onto the parched desert and 
after a few years mastered the art of 
modern irrigation. 
Cary Act Projects 
The early settlers in the arid regions 
irrigated their land by means of small 
ditches which could be constructed at 
little expense. When it became necessary 
to reclaim larger areas of desert the ex- 
pense became too great for small co-opera- 
tive enterprises and for the relief of this 
condition the “Carey Act” was passed by 
congress, which “provides that the fed- 
eral government will grant, without 
charge, to each of the states containing 
desert lands 1,000,000 acres, or as much 
thereof as the state shall cause to be re- 
claimed, provided that such states shall 
bind themselves to dispose of the same 
in tracts of not to exceed 160 acres to 
actual settlers.” Under this act the state 
does not reclaim the land, but avails 
itself of the benefit of the law by means 
of contracts made with construction com- 
panies. “At the request of the state the 
federal government segregates the tracts 
desired. The state then makes a contract 
with some company to construct the nec- 
essary reservoirs and canals.” When the 
work is completed the land is patented 
