FRENCH REPORT OF THE PANAMA CANAL. 267 
what they affirm, and false in what they deny. These philosophies become false 
in becoming divorced from each other, and true as they shall be recomposed so 
as to hold each other in mutual check. The material system alone will drag the 
world down into an awful abyss, and Idealism alone will bear the world into 
clouds of Mysticism and Pantheism. But if the world can be buoyed up by 
Idealism and ballasted by Realism, it will move forward into a true science and 
a true philosophy, until the Hght of a pure religion shall cover the earth. If the 
Baconian Philosophy can be readjusted so that it shall induct all the necessary 
facts both of the material and immaterial worlds, then may we hope for that final 
system of philosophy which shall conserve all the truth of the past ages, and 
accept of all the truth that may be discovered in the ages to come. Let Realism 
be the stem, and Idealism the life, then shall the tree of a true knowledge spread 
out its branches and send forth its leaves for the healing of the nations. 
ENGINEERING. 
TRANSLATION OF A FRENCH REPORT OF THE PANAMA CANAL.i 
IVON D. HEATH. 
From all the reports of the officers of the Panama Canal Company the 
works there are very actively pushed. In the neighborhood of 6,000 workmen 
are found distributed in the various working-places. On its part the company is 
not inactive. It pursues its operations throughout the entire course of the line. 
Two large American companies have each one obtained a special contract 
for constructing the way upon a course of seven miles — one upon the Atlantic 
side and the other upon the Pacific. 
A certain number of miles' of iron-way are already constructed, uniting the 
Panama railroad with the sites chosen for the deposit of the excavations. They 
are also excavating a new port about three miles from Aspinwall, the finishing of 
which will suffer but little delay. 
As preliminary labor almost all the course of the canal has been cleared of 
the forest and staked out. Upon all the line they have constructed houses for 
the laborers and employes. 
From the United States they receive daily at Aspinwall considerable quanti- 
ties of material, consisting of locomotives, wagons for earth-working, woods for 
construction of frame-work, etc. etc. 
Each steamer going from New York to Aspinwall has always something on 
board. 
The health of the workmen is much better than last year. Inland at a cer- 
1 Published at Paris, April 26, 1883, in U Exploration, a Review of tlie Conquests of Civiliza- 
iion from all points of the globe. 
