46 Questions for Solution relating to Meteorohs^y, 



Acapulco and Callao. At the three places first mentioned, the 

 waters appeared to him to be three metres above the level of the 

 South Sea, as taken on the western shores of Mexico and Peru* 

 For as no one can doubt that the general mass of the South- 

 ern and Atlantic Oceans are of the same level ; that portion 

 of the latter near the Antilles, and that which is inclosed in the 

 Gulf of Mexico will thus form a local elevation or intumescence 

 of three metres. 



Before citing a work which does not confirm this result, I 

 ought to mention that my illustrious friend has himself remark- 

 ed, with his usual caution, that his observations were not suffi- 

 ciently numerous to establish the fact of so small a difference of 

 level without any doubt. 



Two engineers not long since crossed America at its narrow- 

 est point, in order to settle definitively the relative position of the 

 two oceans. We may add that their object was not purely of a 

 scientific nature, but had a direct reference to one of the grand- 

 est problems which commerce ever proposed, the possibility of 

 ^ a communication between the Atlantic and South Seas, across 

 the Isthmus of Panama. Such was the object of the investiga- 

 tion, the results of which I am about to state, and which was 

 intrusted by General Bolivar to Mr Lloyd, an English engineer, 

 and a Swedish captain named Palmare. 



The date of this examination is 1828 and 1829, and it was 

 made by means of one of Carey's levels. The point of de- 

 parture is at Panama, on the Pacific Ocean, the level of the 

 highest tides of the equinox corresponding to the third day of 

 the full or of the new moon. Its other extremity is a place 

 named Bruja, to which the influence of the tide extends. Bruja 

 is on the Chagres, about twelve miles (five leagues) from the 

 place where that river discharges itself into the sea of the An- 

 tilles. 



At Panama, the mean difference of the level between high 

 and low water, during strong tides, is 21.2 English feet. At 

 Chagres, on the Atlantic, this difference does not exceed 1.1 feet. 



By thus assuming, in each place, for the mean level of the 

 ocean, a surffice equally remote from the successive levels of the 

 high and low sea, it follows, from the examination of Messrs 

 Lloyd and Palmare : 



