"The Future.—As every country in the West receives a new emigrant, and his plow turns the grass under, that corn and wheat may grow in its stead, the range of the stock-grower is that much contracted, and the area of grazing lessened. By reason of the high value of lands for grain-growing purposes the people of the country east of the Mississippi River are already coming to us for beef and mutton. Chicago and New York people are enjoying the juicy steaks from cattle fattened on our nutritious grasses that grow in our valleys and on our mountain-sides, close up to the perpetual snows of the Rocky Mountains.
"As immigration takes up more and more of the pastures east of us for grain, drovers will be obliged more and more to come to us for beef. Texas, the great hive of cattle, has received three hundred thousand settlers this season. The grazing area of that State has been lessened at least a million acres thereby. Everywhere events point to this Trans-Missouri country as the future dependence of the East for wool, beef, mutton, and horses."
Page 60.—The following article, clipped from the New-York Times, contains so much valuable information, bearing on the question of Irrigation, as related to the Plains and the great Internal Basin of the Continent, that I venture to insert it here. It seems to be a careful resumé of the facts that were brought before the notable Convention of Governors and others, that met in Denver in the autumn of '73, to consider the question of a general and comprehensive system of irrigation for all that region:
WATER SUPPLY FOR THE GREAT PLAINS REQUIRED.
Correspondence of the New-York Times.
Denver, Colorado, Friday, Oct. 17, 1873.
It is a fact, perhaps not generally considered, that the ninety-ninth meridian of longitude west from Greenwich, the meridian of Fort Kearney on the Platte, and Fort Hays, marks a division line in the physical geography of the continent. Here the prairies merge into the great plains, and the abundant rain-fall of eastern meridians ceases. West of this line lies one-half of the area of the United States, all of which, excepting a small strip on the shores of the Pacific, is without sufficient rain-fall for the cultivation of the soil. This great arid region comprises more than two-thirds of Kansas and Nebraska, a large portion of California, Oregon, Washington, and Texas, and nearly all of Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, New Mexico, Idaho, Montana, Arizona, Nevada, and Dakota. Here are one million square miles of barren country, and the question is, What shall we do with it?
The keen interest felt in this matter has been evident from the large attendance upon this convention, and the mass of information and argument presented. Whatever has been done thus far toward reclaiming any portion of these waste lands has been by individual enterprise, except in Utah and New Mexico a system of irrigation has been enforced by legislative enactments. In New Mexico the acequias are the most important features of the country. The subsistence of the people depends upon them, and the laws protecting them fill many pages of the statute books. An overseer of acequias is selected in every precinct, who fixes the number of laborers to be furnished by each land-owner, apportions their work, and distributes the water. Yet not over 300 square miles is under cultivation in that Territory. In Utah, where there is in operation the most complete and successful system of irrigation in this country, only about 140,000 acres are under cultivation. By legislative enactment the counties have power to build canals just as they build roads. Water commissioners are chosen at regular elections, in each county, and their services are paid out of the general tax levy, and they give bonds for the faithful performance of their duties. Subordinate commissioners, or water masters, are selected by neighborhoods, cities, and towns, and they are paid by assessments on the land. There are now over 1,200 miles of irrigating canals in Utah, with a capacity for watering 100,000 acres. The population of the Territory is upward of 150,000. It has 190 prosperous towns and cities. Its farm products are shipped into the neighboring Territories, and even into the Missouri Valley. In Colorado there has been no general plan of irrigation. Private corporations build canals and sell the water therefrom to the ranchmen. Several of the towns are supplied in this way. The colonies have also done much in this respect. But no general system has been adopted in that Territory, nor has the legislature ever taken cognizance of the situation. The same may be said of the other States and Territories interested in this movement. Irrigation has been limited. The few acres that have been reclaimed in the immediate vicinity of the streams and cañons, near the mountains, bear no comparison to the vast body of plain and desert stretching hundreds of miles in every direction.