194 THE WORK OF RUNNING WATER 



gable course. More than ninety-five per cent of the Thames 

 is open to navigation. A canal thirty-five miles long and 

 twenty-eight feet deep conducts ocean-going vessels to and 

 from Manchester. England alone has over two thousand 

 miles of canals. 



At first canals were built entirely for inland carriage, but 

 later canals of international importance have been con- 



PANAMA 

 An example of man's domination over nature. 



structed to shorten the routes of ocean-going steamers. 

 The Suez Canal reduced the distance by boat from England 

 to India by about one third. The Kiel Canal, which con- 

 nects the Baltic with the North Sea, has been of tremen- 

 dous commercial and naval importance to Germany. The 

 Panama Canal is a monument to American efficiency. It 

 gives easy water transportation from the manufacturing 



