Farming and Irrigation. 93 
this, added to more care in dam making, has rendered 
accidents to dams very rare. One thing noticeable in 
the opening of a rainy season is the quickness with 
which the water rises until 56 G.D. is reached. After 
that, although the heaviest rains may pour down, no per- 
ceptible rise is seen on the gauge staff, and this is 
accounted for by the entire area of the country being- 
covered with water, so that there are no streams coursing 
down from higher ground. 56 G.D. being high Spring 
Tide level, all the rivers and creeks at that level are 
constantly in motion towards the sea. This being so, it 
is perfectly safe for any district to impound the natural 
creeks to 56 G.D. without throwing any undue pressure 
on the neighbouring dams. My own opinion is that all 
dams ought to be made with their crown at 60 G.D., at 
which height the security is absolute. I may just remark 
that the highest mark reached in the Lamaha Canal in 
my time was 56.35, and this with the main creek, Lama, 
was entirely closed by an earthen stop-off. 
With regard to the water stored in the rear of the 
cattle farms, all of which are abandoned Cotton Estates, 
with the remains of back and side dams and the corres- 
ponding canals, — these latter may at a trifling cost be 
made the channels for distributing the water over the 
different sections of the grazing grounds. A very slight 
assistance given to nature and a system of warping from 
vegetable growth may be practised. I was forcibly im- 
pressed with this fact when working in the overgrown 
creeks in connection with the Lamaha canal, where men 
were sawing out an overgrowth of vegetation 3 feet thick 
and apparently perfectly solid ; this formation is going 
