426 TELFORD'S CANALS. PART VIII. 



line recommended by him was approved and adopted, 

 and the works were commenced in 1826. A second 

 complete route was thus opened up between Birmingham 

 and Liverpool, and Manchester, by which the distance 

 was shortened twelve miles, and the delay occasioned 

 by 320 feet of upward and downward lockage was done 

 away with. 



Telford was justly proud of his canals, which were the 

 finest works of their kind that had yet been executed 

 in England. Capacious, convenient, and substantial, 

 they embodied his most ingenious contrivances, and 

 his highest engineering skill. Hence we find him 

 writing to a friend at Langholm, that, so soon as he 

 could find " sufficient leisure from his various avocations 

 in his own unrivalled and beloved island," it was his 

 intention to visit France and Italy, for the purpose of 

 ascertaining what foreigners had been able to accom- 

 plish, compared with ourselves, in the construction of 

 canals, bridges, and harbours. " I have no doubt," said 

 he, " as to their inferiority. During the war just brought 

 to a close, England has not only been able to guard her 

 own head and to carry on a gigantic struggle, but at the 

 same time to construct canals, roads, harbours, bridges- 

 magnificent works of peace the like of which are pro- 

 bably not to be found in the world. Are not these things 

 worthy of a nation's pride ? " 



