GOTHA CANAL. 419 



Frodsham are the centres. The channel of the river was 

 extremely crooked and much obstructed by shoals, when 

 Telford took the navigation in hand in the year 1807, 

 and a number of essential improvements were made in it, 

 by means of new locks, weirs, and side cuts, which had 

 the effect of greatly improving the communications of 

 these important districts. 



In the following year we find our engineer consulted, 

 at the instance of the King of Sweden, on the best 

 mode of constructing the Gotha Canal, between Lake 

 Wenern and the Baltic, to complete the communica- 

 tion with the North Sea. In 1808, at the invitation 

 of Count Platen, Mr. Telford visited Sweden and made 

 a careful survey of the district. The service occupied 

 him and his assistants two months, after which he 

 prepared and sent in a series of detailed plans and sec- 

 tions, together with an elaborate report on the subject. 

 His plans having been adopted, he again visited Sweden 

 in 1810, to inspect the excavations which had already 

 been begun, when he supplied the drawings for the locks 

 and bridges. With the sanction of the British Govern- 

 ment, he at the same time furnished the Swedish con- 

 tractors with patterns^ of the most improved tools used 

 in canal making, and took with him a number of ex- 

 perienced lock-makers and navvies for the purpose of 

 instructing the native workmen. The construction of 

 the Gotha Canal was an undertaking of great mag- 

 nitude and difficulty, similar in many respects to the 

 Caledonian Canal, though much more extensive. The 

 length of artificial canal was 55 miles, and of the whole 

 navigation, including the lakes, 120 miles. The locks 

 are 120 feet long and 24 feet broad ; the width of the 

 canal at bottom being 42 feet, and the depth of water 

 10 feet. The results, so far as the engineer was con- 

 cerned, were much more satisfactory than in the case 

 of the Caledonian Canal. Whilst in the one case he had 

 much obloquy to suffer for the services he had given, 



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