April i, 1892.] 
the TROri»lCAL A6fllCULTURl8T, 
7t9 
opposite is an iron vessel being built, and another 
steamer “The Nellie" is being fitted with deck 
cabins. No sign of the vineyards, none of the 
“intense cultivation,” none of the wilderness 
blossoming with the rose. A good deal of “ wilderueas’’ 
and precious little “ rose. ” 'fo make matters worse 
the day was exceptionally disagreeable. A hot, dry, 
close, dusty, beastly, ghastly day. I was not in a 
good humour. I tackled some settlers in the 
coffee palace verandah and jeered at the place 
and was taken up rather sharp in consequence. “ I 
don’t think much of thisplaoe,” I said. “Why not?” 
asked the settler. “.It 's a dry, hot, dusty place and 
hardly up to the glowing accounts I have read of 
it.’’ “ I think you are rather hasty," said the 
settler. “ In the first place you haven't seen it yet, 
and in the second place it is rn exceptionally beastly 
day ; hut you will change your mind before you 
go.*' Well, two drags came dashing up. each driven 
by four horses. I was in no hurry to see Mr W. B. 
ObafTey, to whom I had letters. I wanted to see for 
myself ; so I climbed on to the drag. These drags 
await the arrival of eteamrra and take round visitors. 
The fine horses, bay leaders and grays at the pole, 
rattled us in fine style through the infant city and 
away along the track. The township was scattered 
over with houses large and small, tents of sorts, 
and all the ddbris washing on the advance tide of 
civilization. Here a really fine shop, there a squalid 
makeshift withmostof the household gcols strewn 
around and the inhabitants in “ dishabille.” Then 
a fine school, then a tiny cottage of weather- 
board and iron roof. Then a little box entirely 
made of iron which was more fitted for an 
oven than a dwelling-house. By the way, they 
have what is called "refrigerating’’ paint, which 
when applied to corrugated iron remains cool to 
the touch after being exposed to a fierce blistering 
sun. This renders iron dwellings endurable. It 
might be a “tip" worth knowing by some of your 
planters for their bungalows and factories. 
We stopped first at Mr. Isard’s place. We 
climbed down and walked along the short avenue. 
He has 10 acres and is making his fortune. He 
had struggled hard for years on the bleak Tragowal 
Blains in trying to grow crops with irrigation — but 
three yeurs ago he came here, and here he means to 
stay. 1 separated myself from the others and made 
for a young man who was irrigating. "How often 
do you water like this ?" “ Weil, these apricots 
haven’t been watered since last February and the 
grapes a year last month.” “ Good gracious 1 do 
you mean to say that is all you require ?” “ Well, 
we can’t give the trees more than is necessary to 
crop and grow fresh wood ; and a good soak about 
once a year goes a long way,” “You don’t flood 
the land ?” “Oh no, a quiet thorough soak. ’ You 
can soon tell if the plants get too much water.” 
“ Can you got water when you want it and ns 
much as you want ?” “ Well, we may not get it on 
the very day we ask for it — but then it's sure, and 
a day or two doesn’t much matter.” “How about 
the work ? How do you get the labour to pick 
the crop and do the work?” Well, I took in all the 
crop last year. Mr. Isard doesn’t do very much in that 
way. Of course I had to put in some longdays.” The 
apricot crop had been gathered, and the grape crop 
Was still green, but everything was green and luxuriant. 
I took up some of the soil and squeezed it in my 
hand. It was a soft sandy light chocolate loam — 
in perfect mechanical condition — and evidently full 
of manorial properties. The water, supplied at the 
highest point of each sllotment, is not allowed to 
splash or inundate the soil, but is led along 
furrows formed by the plough on each side of the 
young plants planted about 12 to 15 feet apart. 
^^e«iug eigna of pruning on tbo apricot trees, I 
asked “Why did you prune back those branohea?" 
“ Only for the wind, sir, they get too straggly.” 
I found they had picked about a ton an acre off 
5 acres of apricot. The other five acres was made 
up of a small vineyard and the cottage and sur- 
roundings. 1 noticed a snug arbour — embowered 
with creepers and looking out on the orchard. 
Only 10 acres and making bis tortnne chiefly by the 
local demand for fruit at gcod rates. That’s 
hopeful any way. I climbed into the drag and 
away down the broad avenue ; — past fields being 
brought into order by Ghaffey’a gangs, past a 
cardbouse and a few fowls and a woman weeding 
the young vines planted last season ; over, now 
and again with a dash, the bridged water channels 
along which the precious fluid majestically moved 
far op on the ridges along the highest features 
of the land. Past ploughmen, past irrigators whose 
work was evidenced by the glistening furrows and 
darkened soil. Then into the mallee scrub and 
along the fine ridges where speculators held but 
left untouched large blocks. Out again into culti- 
vated spaces, makeshift residences, and at last wo 
arrive at the Billabong Pumping Btation. Now 
1 must stop a minute or two and describe the 
Pumping Apparatus. And I would mention that 
all this stirred my heart strangely when I thought 
of ray father’s struggles to carry out the same 
splendid thought. The pluck was there, and the 
money was there. The water was there and the 
fine rich soil and dry climate were also there. But 
alas!— 10 years ago— knowledge and skill such as 
is possessed by such experts as Messrs. Cbaffey 
were sadly wanting, and nothing remains in 
dry Dumbara but a splendid ruin of machinery, 
and washed and wasted hill-sides; where the 
abundance of the water carried np lieights un- 
dreamed of by any other cultivator in the world 
acted as a destroying instead of a beneficent 
power; where the constant surface weeding and 
surface splashing and too frequent wettings 
gi-adually resulted in a huge failure. Ah 1 if they 
had but known. If they had only realized that 
a soaking along gi-aded and pulverized ground 
once in ti to 8 months was sufficient. Then the 
height to which the water was carried, some 200 
feet over the .Ymbacotta Gap. 
Before 1 go on with this description I must 
find vent for the rushing thoughts that crowd my 
brain. Chaffey Bros, have found the key to many 
“Eliseums of Bliss,” many enchanted gardens be- 
sides those in California and on the banks of the 
noble Murray. Thoughts of your noble tanks 
and irrigation by rain-water storage and gravi- 
tation. Burely some of all this knowledge here 
exemplified would be of use not only in your dry 
districts towards the north in growing cotton, 
coconuts, and cacao under irrigation, but also over 
Indian’s arid and barren wastes, where, as here, 
noble rivers flow through desert-rainless wastes. 
But iiTigation is a great fact there. As I stood on 
the famous rock of Trichinopoly, the richness of 
country over which the Cauvery had been spread 
into countless channels proved the value of water. 
The water-right, by an agreement dated SOtli 
November 1887, has been transferred from Messrs. 
Geo. and W. B. Chaffey to Chaffey Bros., liiraitod, 
together with all other rights, privileges, licences, 
and authorities obtained from the Government 
under the agreement, previously mentioned. Tha 
next stage is the control of the water right, which 
in reality is of far moi'e value than the land. In 
California, no matter what capital is set upon unim* 
proved laud, the moment it can be shown that 
water can be made available for irrigation its 
value is calculated to have increased fivefold 
even before cultivation and jdautim^ wuiuieuce^ 
