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In Copiapó, May 2, 1877, the undersigned Commission, named by the delegates of the irrigation districts in the valley, for the purpose of formulating a plan for a change in the present system of irrigating, having assembled {the chief water-master being present), after a careful consideration of the reasons advanced by him, has decided that the following plan will be accept- able and proposes it to the delegates and the proprietors in the valley:

In view of the fact that, of all the districts, only the first and the third receive water at their own head gates at their corresponding hours without any loss in bringing it from the next higher district; and, in view of the fact, also, that all the other districts have a certain number of hours belonging to thein which are merely nominal, inasmuch as these hours are lost in bringing the water from the district that precedes them: the Commission believes that, by having each district give up, for the filling of the river, the number of nominal hours which it has, and, in addition, a proportional part for the estimated hours in which the water is devoted to the city, and, receiving the rest plus that taken from the district immediately above, they [the districts] would be placed on equal footing with the first and the third districts.

Each district should give, for the filling of the river, the time which it loses in bringing the water to its last head gates from the last head gates of the district immediately above, plus a proportional part to cover the number of hours estimated as required for the city’s supply.

These losses shall be:

For the second district, the time which it takes the water to go from the head gate of Goyo Diaz to that of Palo Blanco.

For the fourth district, the time from the arrival of water at the last-named head gate to its arrival at the head gate of El Carrizo in Hornito; keeping in mind the waters that arrive before the water of the Cordillera, in order to deduct them from its loss.

For the fifth district, the time it takes the water to go from EI Carrizo to the wasteway (desugiie) of the machine at Totoralillo, either through the gate that is at present in use for waste, or through the channel of the river, or through them both at the same time.

For the sixth district, the time it takes the water to go from the last-men- tioned head gates to the head gate called Esbry, for the haciendas Nantoco and Cerrillos; for the rest of the district, until it arrives at the head gate of San Roman.

For the seventh district, the time that is lost from this last head gate to that of Meléndez.

For the eighth, from that of Meléndez to [that of] the Crucero.

The hacienda of Jorquera [shall lose] one of its irrigating periods twelve hours before the first district begins to irrigaie, and the other, seven days afterwards, and at the same hour.

The irrigating period twelve hours before the fifth district receives water {shall be lost] by the hacienda of Pulido.

The irrigating period for the hacienda of Manflas remains as at present.

2. The Commission proposes the establishment of four periods in the year for calculating the loss to each district: (1) the first turno of January: (2) the first turno of April: (3) the first turno of July; (4) the first turno of October.

3. Each person having interests in an irrigating canal 1s under the obliga- tion of closing his canal gate and leaving it safely closed, in order that what-