INVENTIONS AT PANAMA. 147 



provements in machines for this kind of work are made, the financial 

 prospects of the Panama Comj^any will not by any such instrumental- 

 ity suffer. 



Inventions are one of the factors of the case. If the French can 

 prove themselves as expert in surmounting difficulties as they were 

 twenty years ago, the confidence with which they still apply them- 

 selves to their task will possess a stouter foundation. 



The Hon. John Bigelow, in his report to the New York Chamber 

 of Commerce, after his inspection of the work in February, 1886, ex- 

 presses the opinion that it is upon this factor (inventions) that De Les- 

 seps relies in his anticipations of early success. He adds that De Les- 

 seps's " own remarkable experience " — referring to Suez — has taught 

 him to look with some confidence in this direction. The question of 

 the ultimate success of the French company might possibly hinge upon 

 such a condition. 



The French Academy of Sciences, in a report on the Panama enter- 

 prise, dated August, 1880, says, "Every great undertaking, properly 

 conducted, brings about improvements in the processes of execu- 

 tion." * 



It may not be entirely safe, even in the case of an enterprise run- 

 ning through ten or twelve progressive years, to count on great and 

 radical improvements in the machinery used. On the other hand, such 

 improvements have helped to solve some of the greatest mechanical 

 problems of the century. Such are the Mont Cenis and St. Gothard 

 Tunnels, and the Suez Canal. Will the Panama scheme receive a cor- 

 responding help? It is not to be denied that it has already received 

 assistance of this sort. We proprose to consider the question of inven- 

 tions, as regards each of the engineering works referred to, with refer- 

 ence especially to what has been done and is to be done at Panama. 



We will consider, first of all, the tunnels ; next, the canals. 



W^ork upon the Mont Cenis Tunnel was begun in 1857, about two 

 years before De Lesseps commenced operations in Egypt. The work- 

 ing parties in the opposite headings, French and Italian, met on 

 Christmas-day, 1870, about a year after the mauguration of the Suez 

 Canal. The St. Gothard Tunnel was begun after the completion of 

 the Mont Cenis, in 1872 ; the headings met February 29, 1880. The 

 length of the Mont Cenis Tunnel is over seven and a half miles ; that 

 of the St. Gothard about nine and a quarter miles. These are the 

 longest tunnels ever constructed. 



The invention, by means of which the progress of the work was 

 facilitated, consists in the use of atmospheric air as a motor. By 

 means of water-power, air is reduced to one sixth its ordinary bulk, 

 and the expansive force thus acquired performs the drilling. Owing to 

 the conditions under which tunneling is done, this method is of signal 

 advantage. Each of the Alpine tunnels was excavated through solid 

 * "Bulletin du Canal Interoceanique," Aueust 15, 1880. 



