In preparing the quarterly estimates the supervising engineers, or the district and constructing engineers under them, are called upon for a brief statement of the location of the work and past operations; also, for a paragraph or more as to present conditions, and next a statement as to future operations. In preparing the figures for the estimates, consideration is first had of the amount originally allotted for the work, based upon the engineers' preliminary estimates. From this amount is deducted the amount already expended and a brief table is given of the liabilities in the form of large contracts partly executed. The balance thus obtained shows the amount of money expendable in the future but for which no legal obligations have been incurred. The estimates for the next quarter thus start with a full knowledge of the principal facts as to expenditures made and balances available. BUSINESS METHODS. GENERAL DISCUSSION. One of the matters of prime importance after the inauguration of surveys, examinations, and construction, has been to devise and put in practice modern business methods as far as these are applicable to governmental affairs. Experience has shown that this is not by any means an easy matter. It is impossible for the officers of the Government to transact public business with the same speed and economy with which they conduct their private affairs. Congress has passed many general laws directing how one detail or another of the business of the Government shall be transacted. Many of these laws are very old; · others have been passed without full consideration of the laws then existing, and there are many instances of apparent contradiction. The Reclamation Service has been injected into a great mass of governmental machinery as a new organization, under a new and unique law, with personnel more or less new to the work and to each other, and with the strong desire of new men to accomplish results. In this desire the employees have been spurred by the reiterated desire of public men and of citizens in general to show results at the earliest possible date. The business methods, therefore, have of necessity been established in the saddle." It has not been possible to sit down quietly and devise an ideal way of doing things; on the contrary, it has been necessary to plan a system in the midst of the turmoil of creating the service, of starting surveys, of checking plans, and above all of pushing energetically every detail throughout the least settled part of the United States, at localities hundreds of miles apart. In spite of this handicap, the business methods now in effect are believed to be fairly simple and expeditious. Daily care is, howgiven to perfecting the details. ever, BOOKKEEPING. The system of bookkeeping adopted for the Reclamation Service is satisfactory and embodies only such departures from the ordinary methods as the peculiar needs of the service require. COST KEEPING. As construction has advanced on various projects more and more attention 1 the correct recording of liabilities in such form as to give from day to day the essential facts. The man who is keeping costs, however, must have not merely the principal results obtained by the bookkeeper, but he must have a thorough knowledge of the operations performed and the conditions under which the work was done. The object to be attained by cost keeping is not simply to know what was paid for a given piece of work; the contract price is usually sufficient for this. If a contractor has been paid 14 cents for moving so many thousand yards of earth, this, in popular opinion, may be considered the cost of the work. It is, however, far from the fact; the actual cost may have been more or less. Nothing is more fallacious than to argue that because certain contracts have been let for a certain amount per yard other contracts should be entered into for a similar amount. It is of prime importance to know not merely what the Government has paid or is paying for certain work, but to have clearly analyzed the actual expenditures by the contractor in accomplishing a certain piece of work under certain conditions. This information, to be of value, can not be obtained by simply taking the total expenditures at the end of the job and dividing it by the number of yards of dirt removed. There must be a daily record of conditions and an analysis of these, taking into account the labor and materials, the investment, the delays, cost of transportation, and a large number of other important factors. When the construction work of the Reclamation Service was begun, one of the first difficulties encountered was to obtain figures showing accurately the actual cost of various kinds of work. It was possible to obtain general statements that this or that work has been done for so much money; but these statements had little or no value, because little was known of the cost of labor, subsistence. transportation, and the amount of delays incident to labor troubles, floods, and other causes. It was early seen that the accuracy of future estimates rested upon the obtaining of correct figures of costs under the new conditions prevailing in the West, and special efforts were therefore given to initiating the most modern method of cost keeping. Experience has shown that an exceptionally high class of man, both as an engineer and business man, is required in successful cost keeping on this work. The ordinary engineer does not have a sufficiently analytical mind to grasp all the details, and the successful man at cost keeping is usually found to be the brightest man and the most difficult to keep, as individuals and corporations are continually trying to entice him away, because of his knowledge of actual costs of various classes of work and of the ways in which economies can be successfully introduced. A successful system of cost keeping must include a minute and daily study of every operation, of the arrangement of men, of their supervision, and of the infinite number of details which escape the notice of the ordinary foreman or superintendent. This close analysis leads to the ability to point out where money is being lost by inefficient organization or machinery, and in many instances the Government inspectors on the work under construction have saved contractors from great losses by telling them plainly that their methods or their foremen were inefficient and pointing out the reason, as shown by daily records and observations. Instances might be multiplied where of two subcontractors working side by side and under the same conditions one would be losing money without knowing it and the other making a profit, although the teams and men might be working the same hours and with about the same energy. One man has been handling the material ineffectively with poor tools; the other has been making every stroke count. One of the fundamental questions which has received careful consideration by the engineers of the Reclamation Service is whether irrigation works can be constructed as economically by the Government as by private parties. Between these two methods of performing such work there are certain differences which are inevitable. Upon the whole, however, it is believed that the ultimate cost of the works constructed by the Reclamation Service will compare favorably with that of works built by private capital. One essential particular in which the work of the Reclamation Service differs from similar operations conducted by private parties is that the former must be constructed from the beginning with due regard to permanence, whereas private parties, having small funds available, usually build in the first place temporary structures of wood, to be replaced later on when the increase of land values justifies, by works of steel or concrete. While, therefore, the first cost of the works constructed by the Government will be found notably greater than that of works constructed by private enterprise, allowance should be made for the fact that the former embraces a permanent structure, while the latter usually covers a work of temporary character. OPERATIONS IN ARIZONA. By Louis C. HILL. SALT RIVER PROJECT. GENERAL STATEMENT. On the Salt River project, which was originally selected as the most feasible, work was commenced in October, 1902, by C. R. Olberg, with surveys for a power canal. Cadastral surveys of the lands in Salt River Valley, begun in 1902 by Mr. Robert Muldrow, were completed later by Mr. R. W. Hawley. These surveys have since been extended, and maps covering most of the work have been published. Preliminary construction work was begun in the summer of 1903, but owing to various causes no contracts were let until the following spring, when construction work on both the power canal and the cement mill was begun. Very high floods in the summer of 1904 delayed all work, and during the first four months of 1905 floods greater than those of any year since 1891, and far longer in duration, practically suspended all operations. All the railroad bridges over the Salt and Gila rivers save one were washed out from one to ten times, and the road from Mesa to Roosevelt, over which supplies must be hauled, was under water at frequent intervals. Part of the time food and supplies were packed in on burros. No potable water being available near the Roosevelt dam, it was necessary to pipe water 3 miles from springs in Cottonwood Canyon to two reservoirs, one of 40,000 and one of 20,000 gallons capacity. A septic tank sewage system has been in operation for nearly a year. The Government physician, Doctor Palmer, has been made health officer, with absolute power over all camps in this valley. No cases of typhoid fever have developed here in a year, and the health of the entire community has been remarkably good. The extreme heat of the past summer, lasting almost uninterruptedly from June 1 to October 1, caused many of the men employed in the office to break down. Men in the field, although exposed to the direct rays of the sun, do not seem to suffer in health to the same extent. Most of the land within the flood lines of the reservoir has been purchased, but about 15 per cent will probably have to be condemned on account of bad title or excessive price. POWER CANAL. In September, 1903, final location surveys of the power canal were commenced, the work on the upper half of the canal being placed under the immediate charge of O. T. Reedy and the lower portion under A. M. Sprigg. The canal is nearly 19 miles long, and will have a capacity of 200 second-feet. The water will be carried above the reservoir to a point below the dam, and there |