Altogether, the health propaganda of the Indian Bureau is rendering its most righteous service. The perpetuation of the race is a first consideration. Education, and the protection and accumulation of property are greatly to be desired; to this end we are exerting ourselves to the uttermost, but everything is necessarily secondary to life. IRRIGATION.

Irrigation was practiced to a considerable extent by many Indians of the southwest long before the white man came to this country. Evidences of prehistoric canals and ditches, among the Pimas in Arizona, bear mute testimony of the genius and industry of these people who eagerly grasp the improved facilities offered by the white man and the belated assistance extended by the Government. When the Spaniards came to New Mexico they found the Pueblo Indians packing baskets of earth on their backs to repair their old ditches or construct new ones to irrigate additional lands.

Irrigation is or should be resorted to in those localities where rainfall is insufficient or is not dependably sufficient for crop production. Fundamentally, it consists of the artificial application of water to land for agricultural purposes.

Water for irrigation is ordinarily secured by damming rivers, pumping from underground reservoirs or impounding flood-waters. The first has been longest used and is the most general. Pumping water has been resorted to with satisfactory results, and in some localities is the best, if not the only means, of supply. The impounding of waters which would otherwise be wasted is a method of conservation which has been utilized to a great advantage and is certain to be more extensively employed. There are millions of acres of land, particularly in the southwest, that could in this way be brought under cultivation. Such land lies largely in semiarid sections, where drought and crop failures are so frequent and disastrous as to make failure to employ this feasible solution an economic crime. A notable example of flood-water conservation, from an intermittent and ordinarily limited flow, has been successfully effected in damming a branch of the Trinity River, near Fort Worth, where a great lake, containing an immense and permanent supply of water, has been created. What has been done to furnish water for the city of Fort Worth, and for pleasure purposes, can be as successfully accomplished for irrigating land not only in Texas but everywhere, under like conditions, throughout our entire country.

The fast growing population of the United States and the constantly increasing requirements for food production demand that every acre of tillable land should be made to yield each year to the full extent of its possibilities.

It is indefensible and inexcusable that man whom God has ordained to reign on earth over animate and inanimate things should fail to bring together, for his own benefit, immeasurable land and water waste.

Irrigation has been made enormously profitable by diverting the waters of constantly flowing streams, likewise by pumping from undersurface reservoirs, and the impounding of flood waters has been successfully used in a limited way in semiarid sections, but the time has come when the limit of our possibilities in this last respect must be employed.

The world's war is being directed by the master mind in the White House. The downfall of autocratic governments is writ so plain that he who runs can read. The aftermath, with the successful termination of the war behind us, will involve much more than the reconstruction incident to enlarged human liberty. A people responsible for revolutionizing our all-powerful but faulty financial system through the creation of a Federal Reserve Bank law, making possible the greater local use of wealth production, is certainly capable of taking advantage of the gifts of nature, readily within reach, and subduing the untamed land and water conditions awaiting the head and hand of man.

Truly, America has been prodigal of its natural resources. Golden opportunities lie right at our feet in the development of those great areas of the Southwest where the soil is fertile, the climate salubrious, and the possible yields truly marvelous.

On one Indian reservation alone the aggregate value of the crop raised during the past year exceeded $6,000,000. On another reservation a 5-acre tract in alfalfa yielded over $2,000, the hay having been harvested nine times during the calendar year.

COLORADO RIVER RESERVATION, ARIZ.-To accommodate the everincreasing demand for water at this point, an additional pumping unit was installed during the year. The irrigable lands on this reservation are highly adapted to the production of long staple cotton, and every acre that can be brought under ditch is eagerly sought. The pumping plant is designed to provide water for lands allotted to the Indians only. Upward of 100,000 acres of equally fine land within the reservation could be irrigated by gravity from the Colorado River. A project of this size, however, would cost several million dollars. Congress has not yet authorized the work, although the recent Indian appropriation act carries a small sum for preliminary surveys and investigations at this point. The work should be undertaken, as the latent agricultural possibilities here are tremendous.

CROW RESERVATION, MONT.-The aggregate amount expended in irrigation work on this reservation during the year approximates

$150,000. Main canals and laterals were enlarged and extended so as to bring additional land under ditch; suitable concrete headgates and other structures installed, and many bridges and smaller structures of timber erected. When completed the system on this reservation will serve upward of 70,000 acres. During the year just passed some 13,720 acres were cultivated, with an aggregate crop yield valued at $223,176. The recent Indian appropriation act makes $200,000 available to continue the work.

FORT HALL RESERVATION, IDAHO. Some 12,000 acres within this reservation were cultivated during the past year, 7,712 acres by lessees of Indian land and 5,085 acres by the Indians themselves, an increase of over 3,000 acres. The principal crops are alfalfa, grain, potatoes, and sugar beets, the aggregate value of the crops raised on this project during the year exceeding $500,000. A number of difficulties hamper the most successful operation of this system. The canals and ditches constructed years ago are not of sufficient grade and carrying capacity to serve the area ultimately to be irrigated. The rapid growth of aquatic plants quickly diminishes the carrying capacity of the canals, already too limited; concrete structures improperly designed and constructed, without steel reinforcing, are constantly cracking and settling. Exposure to rigid frost action during the long winters augments this trouble. Other appropriators on the Blackfoot River, above the reservation headings, divert water justly belonging to the Indians and constant attention is demanded to see that their rights are protected. Excess waste, return and drainage waters discharged into Sand Creek by white irrigators, flow down into one of our main canals in such intermittent quantities as to seriously jeopardize its successful operation, frequently resulting in considerable damage to the Government's property.

GILA RIVER RESERVATION, ARIZ.-The Indian appropriation act of May 18, 1916, carried two items for the construction of diversion dams across the Gila River, one near the agency at Sacaton and the other outside the reservation, above the town of Florence. When constructed the dam at the agency will serve Indian lands exclusively, while the one above Florence will serve lands belonging to both Indians and whites. Extensive unexpected erosion of the south bank of the Gila River, at the lower dam site, so widened the river channel as to render the appropriation insufficient for the work. Congress gave additional funds in the recent Indian appropriation act. Plans and specifications covering this dam, which is to carry a bridge superstructure, have been completed and approved and it is expected that the work will be undertaken at an early date.

Construction of the upper diversion near Florence is contingent upon a satisfactory adjustment of conflicting claims to water between Indetha ins and the whites. Negotiations have been continuous,

conferences repeated, and even tentative agreements reached. Binding contracts have not been executed, however, and recent developments indicate that the owners of certain interests in and around Florence have repudiated the former tentative agreement as to a division of these waters. This postpones actual construction indefinitely, as the work is not to begin until these conflicting claims are settled.

NAVAJO RESERVATION, ARIZ. AND N. MEX.-The scarcity of water in the large territory occupied by the Navajo and Moqui Indians renders the irrigation possibilities there exceedingly limited. Out of an aggregate area exceeding 12,000,000 acres, water is now available for some 6,500 acres only; 1,500 acres under the Ganado Project in the southern part of the reserve; 4,000 acres under the Hogback Project, near the San Juan School, and 1,000 acres near Marsh Pass, in northern Arizona. Investigations are being continued from time to time as funds are available, with a view of ascertaining additional areas for which water may be developed, but at best these will be very small, and as far as can be seen at present this vast domain must primarily remain a stock-raising proposition.

In my last annual report I referred briefly to the development of underground water for domestic and stock watering purposes, intimating that the problem confronting the Navajo is not one of grass but of water. Winter rains and summer cloudbursts produce considerable vegetation in regions bare of living streams or perennial springs. Ample forage is frequently at hand if water for domestic and stock needs can be found. The underground water developed for these Indians during the past few years has been of untold value to them during the extreme drought that has visited the southwest recently. Not only have thousands of head of stock been saved to the Navajos, but it has helped in no small way to augment the supply of wool, mutton, and beef available for market. These Indians have always been practically self-supporting, wresting at least a bare existence from an inhospitable country, but under recent market conditions many of them are becoming well-to-do, and a number even independent. Raw wool has been commanding such fancy prices lately that the making of Navajo rugs, formerly a source of considerable revenue, has practically ceased.

UINTAH RESERVATION, UTAH.-The controversy over water rights. in the Uintah Valley, adverted to in my previous report, is still pending before the District Court for the State of Utah, a decision in the matter not yet having been handed down. In the meantime a reasonably satisfactory division of the available water between the Indians and the whites is being had through a water commissioner appointed by the court.

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Large areas of unallotted land within this reservation were opened to homestead entry years ago and it is the settlers on these lands who are now contesting the prior right of the Indians to sufficient water for their needs. In the entire district there are some 46,000 acres under irrigation, being n increase of 11,000 acres over the past year. This represents an increase of over 30 per cent. The value of the crops raised by the Indians themselves exceeded $95,000.

YAKIMA RESERVATION, WASH.-One of the most successful large irrigation projects with which the Indian Service has to deal is located on the Yakima Reservation, Wash. Designed to supply 120,000 acres, ultimately, we find over 64,000 acres now under actual cultivation. During the past year the crop yield exceeded $6,000,000. The Indian appropriation act for the present fiscal year carries $500,000 for the continuation of this work, which is being pushed as rapidly as existing conditions will permit. Machinery is resorted to, wherever possible, as a substitute for hand labor, and the three dragline excavators at work on this project removed 602,354 cubic yards of earth at an average cost of 10 cents per cubic yard. This is 50 per cent cheaper than estimated for several years ago, when labor and supplies were less expensive.

WIND RIVER RESERVATION, Wro.-Present plans call for the irrigation of approximately 73,000 acres within this reservation, of which some 50,000 acres are now under ditch. About $200,000 was expended in this work during the year just ended, resulting in the addition of many miles of main canals and distributing laterals, with the attendant diversion structures, bridges, etc. Drainage of certain seeped areas had to be resorted to, with satisfactory results. Considerable areas within this reservation are leased, and still others are devoted to the cattle industry. The area actually cultivated yielded a gross return of over $325,000, of which $142,181 belonged to the Indians and $182,883 to the whites.

ZUNI RESERVATION, N. MEX.-About 5,000 acres within this reservation are now under ditch, being supplied with water from a reservoir constructed years ago. The rapidity with which this reservoir is filling with silt is becoming alarming. Since its completion 11 years ago the reservoir has lost 54 per cent of its capacity from this cause. At this rate the life of the reservoir is about 21 years, of which 11 years have already passed. The capacity of the reservoir is decreasing, of course, in proportion to the deposit of silt, and unless some form of relief is soon devised the reservoir will be practically useless. The life of the reservoir may be extended temporarily by elevating the crest of the present dam and spillway, but the extent to which this can be carried is limited by natural surroundings. it has been estimated that an expenditure of $13,000 in increasing the height of the dam will add possibly 11 years to the life of the