"By referring to the tenth annual report of the director of the U. S. Geological Survey, we learn that the arid regions of the United States, comprise the astonishing area of one million, three hundred thousand square miles. This immense region contains more than one-third of all our lands; a territory much larger than that of the thirteen original states combined. North and south, it stretches for hundreds of miles on either side of the Rocky Mountain Range, that great backbone and water-shed of our Continent. On the west, it covers nearly all of the surface of that vast, broken and irregular basin, lying between the Rocky and Sierra Nevada Mountains. On the east, it occupies that extended and peculiar domain of high plateaus, treeless plains and alkali barrens, known as the Great American Desert. "From this broad expanse of arid lands, in accordance with the statements of the survey officials, we may choose an area of one hundred and fifty thousand square miles of irrigable lands; that is lands which may be restored to productive fertility, by means of irrigating ditches along the valleys, and by building great catch basins, near the head waters of a multitude of mountain streams, in which may be conserved, the wasting waters of melting snows and those of the heavy mountain rainfalls combined. At this point we may mention incidentally, that this area of irrigable lands could be largely increased, by covering the available slopes of the Rocky Mountains with dense forests of fine timber. With this accomplished, the annual rainfall would be doubled, while the necessary conditions would be established, which, a few decades hence might yield an annual crop of valuable timber, that would soon repay the entire cost of planting and culture. "In addition to the last named increase, we may add an area of lands equal in size to the state of Illinois, which are beyond the reach of irrigating streams. We find these lands along the eastern foothills of the Rocky Mountains, and around the borders of the Great American desert. They may easily be restored to fertility, by the skillfully applied labor of a legion of co-operative farms. At varying depths beneath these lands, flow perennial streams of artesian water. By the spouting, life-giving waters of a vast number of artesian wells, a large proportion of these desert lands can be transformed to an agricultural paradise. The cost of these wells, would be but little more than the expense of the labor required to bore them. "But, says the objector, are not these mostly alkali lands? Of course they are! And for that reason offer greater possibilities of value! Can they be made to grow wheat, and thus increase the bread supply? Is a question that comes from the mouths of the world's great army of bread eaters, six hundred million strong. Just think of it!