326 



GEOGRAPHICAL EXPLORATIONS AND DISCOVERIES IN 1870. 



and the way traffic, this route was preferable 

 to any other, yet for heavy and bulky freights, 

 for emigrants and second-class passengers, for 

 the large and increasing trade of the Central- 

 American states, the west coast of South 

 America, Australia, the Sandwich Islands, and 

 the more bulky Chinese and Japanese goods, 

 there was need of water transit, which, though a 

 little longer, should not require any transship- 

 ment of the goods, and yet should not encounter 

 the dangers and longdelay of the voyage around 

 Cape Horn. The Panama route, requiring a 

 double transshipment, did not meet this want, 

 nor will the Honduras Railway fully satisfy it, 

 since, though materially shorter and cheaper, 

 the cost of transshipment is still incurred. No 

 possible route, which consisted in part of rail- 

 way, could answer the purpose, for though 

 there might be an advantage to passengers in 

 having several competing routes, from the 

 better accommodations and the cheaper price 

 of passage which would ensue, and the local 

 trade of the Central- American states with the 

 Atlantic and Pacific ports might be sufficient 

 to sustain one or more lines, yet the great 

 point was still unreached, that goods once 

 shipped must not break bulk till they reached 

 their destination, if they were to be carried 

 cheaply and safely. It was obvious that there 

 must be a ship-canal across some one of the 

 isthmuses which exist on that portion of the 

 continent. Over and over again, for two hun- 

 dred years and more, has the question been 

 agitated, where this canal should, or rather 

 where it could, be constructed. England, 

 France, and the United States, have each ex- 

 plored many times different sections, but had 

 failed to find a point where such a canal would 

 be possible, except at an expense too great to 

 be safely hazarded by any one nation. There 

 were several routes, indeed, through which it 

 might be possible to cut a canal, but only at an 

 expense of two hundred or three hundred mill- 

 ion dollars. At Panama the route was not 

 long, but it would require a tunnel of from 

 seven to twelve miles through the solid granite 

 deep enough and high enough to permit the 

 largest vessels to pass two abreast, with masts 

 all up. 



At first it seemed that the Nicaragua route 

 afforded all necessary advantages for a canal ; 

 but good harbors on both oceans were as ne- 

 cessary as any other consideration, and, though 

 the canal itself and the slack- water and lake 

 navigation could be accomplished for a com- 

 paratively moderate sum, the expense of arti- 

 ficial harbors on both sides and of structures 

 for entrance to and exit from the lake involved 

 a probable expense nearly or quite equal to 

 that of the Panama tunnel. A route across 

 the Isthmus of Chiriqui offered some advan- 

 tages, but there were no good harbors on 

 either side, and no possibility of making them 

 except at an enormous expense. Through 

 nearly the whole of 1870, and into 1871, Com- 

 mander Selfridge, of the United States Navy, has 



been engaged in careful exploration of the Isth- 

 mus of Darien, and, after many disappointments 

 and hardships, he succeeded in discovering a 

 route with good harbors on both sides, and an 

 altitude so moderate as to admit of an open 

 canal with but few locks, and a sufficient sup- 

 ply of water to fill them. The greatest alti- 

 tude of the summit is under three hundred 

 feet, and this is but for a short distance. The 

 route begins with the Cacarica, a tributary of 

 the Atrato River (up which latter river there 

 is good navigation for large steamers for twelve 

 miles), and turns gradually southwestward, 

 striking a navigable river on the Pacific side. 

 The distance is considerably longer than the 

 Panama Railroad, but the route is more prac- 

 ticable than any yet discovered. 



Attention has also been called during the 

 year to the feasibility of a ship-canal across 

 the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, over which a 

 railway is already located, though not built, 

 and a Government commission has been sent 

 out to explore it, under command of Captain 

 Shufeldt, of the United States Navy. The 

 length of the canal and slack-water navigation 

 would be 173 miles, and it would require, ac- 

 cording to the statement of Colonel J. J. "Wil- 

 liams, the chief engineer of the Tehuantepec 

 Railway Company, 130 lifting locks, each of 

 10 feet lift. The summit is 684 feet above the 

 sea, but can be supplied with all the water it 

 needs, and, if the cuttings are made 60 feet in 

 depth at the summit, the number of locks 

 might be reduced to 118. The harbors on both 

 sides can be made good at no very heavy ex- 

 pense. The number of locks seems an objec- 

 tion for a ship-canal, as they must necessarily 

 materially enhance the tolls and delay the pas- 

 sage. Colonel Williams estimates the cost of 

 such a canal as under $32,000,000, in which are 

 not included, however, the harbor improve- 

 ments, nor the construction of the locks on the 

 double transit plan, which is preferable. These 

 would probably bring the cost up to $50,000,- 

 000 and in the actual construction it would 

 be safe to add 50 per cent, to this estimate. 



IV. SOUTH AMERICA. The narrative of 

 Messrs. Myers, "Life and Nature under the 

 Tropics," to which we have already referred, 

 gives a very graphic and interesting account 

 of the geography, inhabitants, customs, man- 

 ners, productions, etc., of the interior of Vene- 

 zuela, as it appeared to these young but care- 

 ful observers in 1867-'68. Their explorations 

 were mostly confined to the course of the 

 Upper Orinoco and its vicinity, to an overland 

 journey from that river by way of Javita and 

 Moroa to the Rio Nigro, and the descent of 

 that river to the Amazons at Manaos. They 

 also visited Ecuador and explored some por- 

 tion of its territory, on which Mr. Hassnurek 

 had previously been almost our only authority. 

 The portion of Venezuela which they traversed 

 had not before been visited by any North- 

 American traveller, and, indeed, Humboldt 

 and Bonpland, and much later the naturalist 



