TEANSACTIONS. 71 



therefore, appropriately be considered in connection with 

 our more special topic, and it will not be amiss to contrib- 

 ute something to the correction of a widely diffused popu- 

 lar error. In our indiscriminate national self-esteem, we 

 are apt to imagine that the excellence of our political in- 

 stitutions has extended itself to all our national undertak- 

 ings, and that the builders of our canals, railroads and 

 highways are as superior to European engineers in con- 

 structive skill as the framers of our federal constitution, 

 to the deputies of the convention in tlic French revolu- 

 tion, in political wisdom; but this is an assumption by no 

 means yet warranted by proof. What our engineers might 

 do with a larger command of time and means, remains yet 

 to be seen ; but the utmost they have yet accomplished in 

 the way of internal improvements, with the almost solitary 

 exception of our wooden bridges, not only falls short of 

 what has been effected upon every important railway, but 

 finds its parallel upon almost every great common road in 

 Europe. 



The European public works arc generally superior to 

 ours, both in boldness of plan and in thoroughness and 

 fidelity of execution. The canals, whether for navigation 

 or for irrigation, exhibit an intimate familiarity with the 

 laws of hydraulics ; and the masonry and all the appurten- 

 ances are usually of the most finished, solid and permanent 

 character. The railroads exhibit even a more marked su- 

 periority over our own. The line is usually admirably 

 planned ; difficult grades and long circuits are avoided by 

 tunneling, which is carried so far that it is not uncommon 

 to pass through eight or ten miles of tunnel in a single 

 day's journey; the track is always double; all embank- 

 ments and the scarp of all earth cuttings arc either sodded 

 or paved, thus avoiding the annoyance of dust and tlie dan- 

 ger of slips and slides ; the bridges arc usually of stone, 

 and the masonry of these as well as of the viaducts, some 

 of which, as at Venice, are more than two miles long, is of 



