_Tree fruits._ Water is conducted through very narrow furrows from three to five feet apart, and allowed to sink about four feet deep, and to spread under the ground. Then the supply is cut off. The object is to wet the soil deeply, and then by tillage to hold the moisture in the soil.
_Small fruits._ The common practice is to run water on each side of the row until the rows are soaked.
_Potatoes._ A thorough soaking is given the land before planting-time, and then no more than is absolutely necessary until blossoming-time. After the blossoms appear keep the soil moist until the crop ripens.
_Garden crops._ Any method may be employed, but the vital point is to cultivate the ground as early as it can be worked after it has been irrigated.
_Meadows and alfalfa._ Flooding is the most common method in use. The first irrigation comes early in the spring before growth has advanced much, and the successive waterings after the harvesting of each crop.
As ours is a country in which the people rule, every boy and every girl ought to be trained to take a wide-awake interest in public affairs. This training cannot begin too early in life. A wise old man once said, "In a republic you ought to begin to train a child for good citizenship on the day of its birth."
[Illustration: FIG. 289. BEAUTY FROM FLOWERS AND GRASS]
[Illustration: FIG. 290. A COUNTRY ROAD IN MECKLENBURG COUNTY, NORTH CAROLINA]
Happy would it be for our nation if all the young people who live in the country could begin their training in good citizenship by becoming workers for these four things:
Second, attractive country schoolhouses and school grounds.
If the thousands on thousands of pupils in our schools would become active workers for these things and continue their work through life, then, in less than half a century, life in the country would be an unending delight.
One of the problems of our day is how to keep bright, thoughtful, sociable, ambitious boys and girls contented on the farm. Every step taken to make the country home more attractive, to make the school and its grounds more enjoyable, to make the way easy to the homes of neighbors, to school, to post-office, and to church, is a step taken toward keeping on the farm the very boys and girls who are most apt to succeed there.