San Antonio de Bexar: A Guide and History Page: 50

SAN ANTONIO DE BEXAR.

course irrigates all those lands west of the San Pedro creek. The I. & G. N. R.
R. follows pretty closely its line as far as the ditch goes. This ditch finally joins
the Alazan creek some little distance before that creek joins the San Pedro creek.
It was finished and opened June 9th, 1875. It cost the city with the Valley ditch,
a branch of the Alamo Madre ditch, mentioned before, and constructed at the same
date $33,000. The Alazan was a bold and practical conception, but the work
seems to have been inadequately done.
The control of the ditches has long since left private hands. The first Amer-
ican manager of ditches was Capt. J. H. Beck in 1850. In 1858 the city took
them in hand and on January 1st of that year John Fries was appointed first Ditch
Commissioner by A. A. Lockwood, mayor. That office is at present held by
Mr. Frank Huntress.
The San Antonio River.
But then I love its lazy days'
Perpetual blaze of bluest blue,
And love to bask as oft I do
Down where the river winds its ways,
Where giant trees the Summer through
Seem halls that echo wizard lays,
Where all day long those lays are heard
From throbbing throat of mocking bird
Above the chorus crickets raise,
Where most I miss the purple hue
And scents of heaths and heather,
And where I love to sing the praise
Of Texas Summer weather.
-THE B. B. IN TEXAS.
The story of the river as applied to
the public interests of our city is a story
to make angels weep and to cause the
alligators, if our river had any, not only
to shed crocodile tears, but to actually
feel sad, and this is all the more touching
when it is considered that sadness must
be a feeling strange to animals of such
proverbially good digestions. Of course
the alligators are hypothetical, they
were never pets of our Saint Anthony. The good saint in the first place made
his river too crooked for their comfort and in the second they concluded that he
and his river were entirely too fresh for them, so they returned to the muddy
bayous of Eastern Texas. But this is not to be a history- of angels or alligators,
but a word or two about a subject we are just a little chary of handling without
gloves; this accounts for our quoting poetry and dragging angels in by the nim-
bus and wandering off to such irrelevant subjects as alligators.

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