IRRIGATION 
used for a multitude of purposes which 
had no place in the life of primitive peo- 
ples. The inventions which led to the 
use of steam as a motive power enor: 
mously increased the consumption and 
industrial importance of water. Improve- 
ments in machinery to utilize differences 
in level in the generation of power, and 
the marvelous electrical inventions by 
which this power is transmitted to re- 
mote cities, have given to streams an 
entirely new and hitherto unthought of 
value. In nearly every industrial enter- 
prise, great or small, water is an indis- 
pensable factor. It feeds the steam boiler, 
it cools the jackets of steel furnaces, it 
is the solvent in most chemical processes, 
and is turned to use and made an agent 
in the creation of wealth in a multitude 
of ways which need not be enumerated. 
Moisture is necessary to plant growth, 
and in arid lands this moisture is sup- 
plied largely from streams. Hence in 
such regions the right to use rivers in 
irrigation is an indispensable requisite to 
any large creation of wealth in lands. 
As population increases and civilization 
advances there is not only a more ex- 
tensive but a more intensive use of wa- 
ter. The higher the standard of living 
and the greater the skill of artisans, the 
greater is the number of needs of the 
household and the larger the number of 
uses to which water may be put. So ex- 
tended have the demands for water be- 
come in arid and in many humid sections 
that the resources of individuals are en- 
tirely inadequate to meet them, and great 
corporations are formed for acquiring 
water, constructing dams, building stor- 
age works, canals, and pipe lines for the 
conveyance and distribution of water for 
different purposes. The future of New 
York City was menaced a few years ago 
by legislation which gave to a powerful 
private corporation the exclusive right to 
acquire water supplies needed or likely 
to be needed by that city. 
No field of engineering has made 
greater advances within the past half 
century than that connected with the 
regulation and distribution of water. 
These are shown in the lessening losses 
1189 
from seepage and evaporation, in the les- 
Sened cost and increasing durability of 
structures, and in the inventions and 
devices for the accurate division and 
measurement of water. A similar ad- 
vance has been made with respect to the 
utilization of water supplied from be- 
neath the earth’s surface. Large sums 
of money are being expended in investi- 
gations to determine the extent and loca- 
tion of underground waters. Skilled en- 
gineers are constantly making improve- 
ments in the methods of boring wells, 
building tunnels or galleries to intercept 
underground streams, and in cheapening 
and simplifying pumps and engines for 
lifting water to the earth’s surface. State 
experiment stations and the Department 
of Agriculture are studying how econ- 
omy in the use of water in irrigation 
may be promoted, and cities find waste 
in domestic water supplies a serious evil. 
There is nothing in farming where 
rainfall is ample which corresponds to 
the intensity of feeling which marks the 
struggle for control of streams in arid 
lands, or the anxiety which besets irri- 
gators regarding the stability of their 
water titles. The farmer who remains 
serene of spirit when he sees his fields 
burning for lack of water and knows that 
his loss of crops is due to wasteful use 
by others is a rare if not impossible 
character. 
Advancing civilization has done more 
than augment the uses and value of wa- 
ter; it has increased the evils and dan- 
gers arising from water. The ice gorges 
along the Ohio and Mississippi rivers 
were a matter of small concern when 
Indians were the only people concerned. 
Now they often cost millions of dollars 
and hazard many lives. Hence immense 
sums of money are being expended to 
protect commerce from their action. Ev- 
ery reservoir, every diversion dam in a 
stream, every artificial waterway adds 
a new element of danger and insecurity 
to the lives and property below and gives 
ground for new laws and regulations with 
respect to the management of water. The 
swamps and marshes created through the 
interruption of underground water sup- 
