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ECOMOMIC GEOLOGY.
TRANS-PECOS TEXAS.
MINERALS.—The ore-bearing character of the Carrizo Mountains is fully proved-magnetic iron, copper and lead ores, with silver and gold, having been found, and good results shown wherever prospecting has been done. The Hazel mine was carefully studied, as being the best developed property in the district, and the Third Annual Report will contain a description showing the amount and character of work which has been done in it. The production has already exceeded $60,000, although very little stoping has been done. The fine marbles of this range will some day attract the attention they so richly deserve.
WATER SUPPLY.—The first requisite to the proper development of Trans-Pecos Texas is an adequate and constant water supply. Prof. Streeruwitz, in every report he has made, from the beginning of the Survey, has urged this matter strenuously, showing that wells or streams could not be depended on, and that the storage of water in reservoirs was the only practical way of accomplishing this end. He also shows that the character of the topography and the rock formation is such that there are many places at which storage reservoirs could be built at moderate cost, which would be suitably located for irrigating large bodies of very fertile lands, or for use in mining operations, or for the raising of stock His own observations, as well as those of the government observers at Fort Davis and Fort Bliss, prove that the annual rainfall is sufficient to give an adequate supply for all these purposes if it is properly cared for. The greatest obstacle to be overcome is the fact of the larger part of the lands being sectionized, and the alternating sections belonging to the State and railroads respectively, so that no one could get a sufficient amount of land in a body to warrant the expenditure necessary for building a dam
During my visit to his camp in the Diabolo Mountains, last summer, this matter was one of the most constant discussion, and it finally occurred to me that there might be a possibility of the inauguration of this work by the State, provided locations could be found which would be entirely on State lands, and that it would be possible to utilize convict labor in building the dams and in the necessary preparations for irrigation. The State, in its various branches of University, Public School, Asylum and unoccupied lands, is most largely interested in this section. These lands are practically valueless in their present









