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APPENDIX. 
with which you are endowed, to the execution of the enterprise contained 
in the present representation, and to which is annexed the project I have 
conceived for forming a communication between the two oceans. 
By this your Excellency will see that I propose to execute this grand 
work in a very short time, considering the magnitude of the enterprise ; 
that I ask not the least pecuniary assistance from the government ; and 
that from the commencement I offer to the national treasury a considera- 
ble revenue, viz., one fourth of the net profits which may arise from the 
dues and imposts to be collected on the line of the route, and which 
dues and imposts will, after the term of fifty years, belong wholly to the 
Republic. 
What I ask as an indemnification of expenses is certainly not much, 
when it is recollected that it will be necessary to form ports, raise fortifi- 
cations and various other edifices, and open roads and canals ; and when 
it is borne in mind that the indemnification does not consist in any valua- 
ble property of which the government is at present possessed, but in 
property to which I must create a value. 
Should the lands of which I solicit a grant come to have a value here- 
after, my exertions will have caused this effect, for at the present day 
they have none whatever. 
The enterprise could not be undertaken for less than what I have so- 
licited, because the magnitude of the works will be such as probably to 
absorb the resources arising from what I ask. 
Your Excellency cannot fail to remark two very striking features in my 
project. First, the establishment of the lands to be conceded for the en- 
terprise into a neutral territory : this is a point worthy of the magnanimi- 
ty of government, and necessary to interest all nations, in order that the 
communication may not be seized by any foreign power, but be ever pre- 
served as the property of the Republic. Secondly, that I have not pro- 
posed to open immediately a ship canal across the Isthmus ; because I 
have seen this project abandoned in other parts of Central America and 
Columbia, for it had to encounter invincible difficulties on account of its 
magnitude. Desirous of carrying into execution a very gigantic under- 
taking, a lesser, but still a grand one, has been neglected. 
Convinced that it has been well and truly said that, "By grasping at 
too much, we often lose what is in our power ," I have resolved to carry the 
latter into effect, without, however, renouncing my hopes of accomplish- 
ing the former. Although a communication by water will not be at- 
tempted for the present, this will infallibly take place when the Isthmus 
shall be well known to all nations as forming a convenient centre for car- 
