THE FIRST ALBATROSS EXPEDITION 245 



" It seems quite natural for me to be here again in 

 the same old hotel where I have so often stopped and 

 with the same landlord who was here in 1859, when I 

 first passed through on my way to California, and who 

 has been here ever since. He seemed quite pleased to 

 see me again and has made me as comfortable as one 

 can be in a combination of a French-Spanish mansion. 



" The canal can be fairly seen from the line of the 

 railroad, and it is really frightful to see the waste; the 

 whole length of the line is one long village, houses for 

 the men, and all along you find dredges by the half- 

 dozen laid up and going to pieces, and in a few locali- 

 ties every ten miles or so there is an entrepot with miles 

 of machinery, much of which has never been used, and 

 no less than six large steamers have returned to Europe 

 filled with the wrecks which could be still used else- 

 where. There has been much less work done than I 

 imagined, judging from the money sj)ent; it was gen- 

 erally supposed that nearly one-third was done, but I 

 hardly think there is one-tenth of the work finished. 

 They have, it is true, some twenty-five miles of canal in 

 the plains at the two ends well advanced, but the real 

 work of cutting consists only of a few scratches, nowhere 

 more than twenty feet below the railroad ! 



" I go on board the Albatross this p.m., and we start 

 to-morrow. The working accommodations are fine, an 

 upper room twenty by twenty for rough work and gen- 

 eral laboratory, and a second floor below for storing the 

 collection in racks — we ought to do well. My cabin is 

 nine by eight ; I have a closet to hang things, about 

 twelve good-sized drawers under my bunk and in a 

 bureau, and I keep one of my trunks to stow away stuff, 

 a couple of shelves and hooks, and you have my equip- 



