348 THE ADDRESSES, LECTURES, ETC., OF 



wholly insufficient to do justice to the great engineering works of 

 the present day, and I must therefore limit myself to making a 

 short allusion to a few only of the more remarkable enter- 

 prises. 



The great success, both technically and commercially, of the 

 Suez Canal, has stimulated M. de Lesseps to undertake a similar 

 work of even more gigantic proportions, namely, the piercing of 

 the Isthmus of Panama by a ship canal, 40 miles long, 50 yards 

 wide on the surface, and 20 yards at the bottom, upon a dead level 

 from sea to sea. The estimated cost of this work is 20,000,000, 

 and, more than this sum having been subscribed, it appears un- 

 likely that political or climatic difficulties will stop M. de Lesseps 

 in its speedy accomplishment. Through it, China, Japan, and the 

 whole of the Pacific coasts will be brought to half their present 

 distance, as measured by the length of voyage, and an impulse to 

 navigation and to progress will be given which it will be difficult 

 to over-estimate. 



Side by side with this gigantic work, Captain Eads, the suc- 

 cessful improver of the Mississippi navigation, intends to erect his 

 ship railway, to take the largest vessels, fully laden and equipped, 

 from sea to sea, over a gigantic railway across the Isthmus of 

 Tehuan tepee, a distance of 95 miles. Mr. Barnaby, the chief 

 constructor of the navy, and Mr. John Fowler have expressed a 

 favourable opinion regarding this enterprise, and it is to be hoped 

 that both the canal and the ship railway will be accomplished, as 

 it may be safely anticipated that the traffic will be amply sufficient 

 to support both these undertakings. 



Whether or not M. de Lesseps will be successful also in carrying 

 into effect the third great enterprise with which his name has been 

 prominently connected, the flooding of the Tunis-Algerian Chotts, 

 thereby re-establishing the Lake Tritonis of the ancients, with its 

 verdure-clad shores, is a question which could only be decided 

 upon the evidence of accurate surveys, but the beneficial influence 

 of a large sheet of water within the African desert could hardly be 

 matter of doubt. 



It is with a feeling not unmixed with regret that I have to 

 record the completion of a new Eddystone Lighthouse, in sub- 

 stitution for the chef-tT wuvre of engineering, erected by John 

 Sineaton more than 100 years ago. The condemnation of that 



