45 o The National Geographic Magazine 



other plant at an estimated cost of 

 $29,000,000. It is said that the terre- 

 plein of Christobal Colon, on which the 

 superintendent's residence was built, 

 was constructed almost entirely of dis- 

 carded material from this purchase. In 

 fact, I saw a great amount of material 

 so disposed of myself. 



It should be noted that the Panama 

 Railroad, which ran over practically the 

 same route as did the canal, was of great 

 importance to the canal company in con- 

 structing the canal, not only on account 

 of its facilities for handling supplies, but 

 because the railroad company's conces- 

 sion covered any system of transporta- 

 tion which might be adopted along its 

 line. This made it necessary, in order to 

 control the road, for the canal company 

 to purchase most of its stock, which 

 alone took out nearly $19,000,000 worth 

 of assets. 



FEARFUL LOSS OF LIFE 



It should also be noted that the sani- 

 tary question was not only an impor- 

 tant, but a very expensive, item to the 

 company. There was ample provision 

 for caring for the sick, with large and 

 expensive hospitals under control of the 

 company, but little or no attention was 

 paid to precautionary measures, which 

 now are considered such important fac- 

 tors in sanitary science. Those of us 

 who visited Colon in the height of the 

 boom may recall the ghastly scenes 

 which met our eyes. One might wit- 

 ness on almost any morning a scaven- 

 ger's wagon going about the town gath- 

 ering up the bodies of those who had 

 succumbed during the night in the hov- 

 els of the place or in the streets to the 

 prevailing disease which fed on the filth 

 of the land. The celebrated suburb of 

 Colon, " Monkey Hill," was the recep- 

 tacle for these corpses, which received 

 in transportation and burial less consid- 

 eration than would usually be given to 

 a dead dog. 



The plan adopted by the new Panama 



Canal Company , as stated in the Isthmian 

 Commission's report, involved two levels 

 above the sea level; one of them, an arti- 

 ficial lake to be created by a dam at 

 Bohio, to be reached from the Atlantic 

 side by a flight of two locks, and the 

 other, the summit level, to be reached by 

 a flight of two locks from the preceding, 

 the summit level to have its bottom 68- 

 feet above the sea and to be supplied with 

 water from a feeder leading from an arti- 

 ficial reservoir to be constructed at Alha- 

 juela in the upper Chagres Valley ; the 

 ascent on the Pacific side to be likewise 

 of four locks, of which the two middle- 

 ones are combined in flight ; the canal 

 to have a depth of 29.5 feet, and a bot- 

 tom width of about 98 feet, with an in- 

 creased width in certain specified parts.. 

 Its general location was that adopted 

 by the old company. The cost was- 

 estimated at $101,850,000 for the work, 

 which did not include administration, 

 or financing ; this matter of financing: 

 was estimated at nearly $100,000,000. 

 While this was the plan recommended 

 by the French engineers, they workedl 

 out in detail a second plan, which is an 

 extension or modification of the fore- 

 going, which they seemed to prefer in? 

 itself, but which they feared would re- 

 quire more time to execute. Under the- 

 second plan the upper level was omitted, 

 the cut through the continental divide- 

 being deepened until its bottom was 32- 

 feet above the sea ; Lake Bohio was- 

 made the summit level and was fed di- 

 rectly by the Chagres ; one flight of " 

 locks on the Atlantic side and one om 

 the Pacific was omitted ; the feeder- 

 from Alhajuela was omitted, but the- 

 dam at that place was retained. The 

 estimated cost of completing this plam 

 was not much greater than that for the- 

 other, being about $105,500,000. In 

 both plans the dam at Bohio converted 

 the river between that point and Obispo • 

 into a lake of such dimensions as not to- 

 be seriously affected by the partial floods- 

 admitted to it, while diversion channels. 



