286 



dressed to the provincial legislature. When 

 we consider in one view the gigantic works, 

 little indeed to be praised, which have been 

 executed within two centuries, for diminishing 

 the waters of the lakes in the valley of Mexico, 

 we conceive that with the same labor, the 

 isthmus of Nicaragua and Huasacualco might 

 have been cut, perhaps even that of Panama, 

 between Gorgona (on the Rio Chagre), and the 



boats first descend uniformly, by 25 locks, from Buffalo on 

 the lake Erie, to Montezuma, on the river Seneca (passing 

 by Palmyra and Lyon on a length 166 English miles), 3fr 

 toises of perpendicular fall ; they then ascend 8 toises from 

 Montezuma to Rome, on the Mohawk, for 77 miles, and 

 finally, descend again 6S toises without discontinuing, by 

 means of 46 locks, on a length of 113 miles, from Rome to 

 Albany, on the river Hudson, passing by Utica. This latter 

 descent is consequently 9 toises less than that made by the 

 boats of the basin of partition of the canal of Languedoc in 

 the Mediterranean. I shall again mention on this occasion, 

 the maximum of the slope which I went up on a natural na- 

 vigable line, in the bed of one of the greatest rivers of South 

 America, destitute of cataracts and rapids. You go by row- 

 ing on the Rio Magdalena, from Carthagena to Honde, after 

 having vanquished 135 toises of fall, which is one half more 

 than the fall of the lake Erie to the river Hudson, and by the 

 Magdalena, a navigable line, one third longer. In reflecting 

 on the small slope of the Rio Magdalena de Morales at its 

 mouth, we may conceive that without locks, a boat may 

 proceed, by a natural navigable line, 80 marine leagues, on 

 a tables-land of 100 toises, which will give 44 of fall by 

 1000 toises of current. 



