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of the cut of the isthmus would amount to severs 

 or eight hundred thousand piastres, that sum 

 would be supported either by the undertakers 

 or by the different states of America, of which 

 the trade would derive inappreciable advan- 

 tages from the opening of a new way towards 

 Peru, the western coast of Quito, Guatimala, 

 Mexico, Nutka, or the fur-coast, and to China. 



With respect to the mode of execution, on 

 which I have been recently consulted by well- 

 informed persons belonging to the new govern- 

 ments of Equinoxial America, I believe that a 

 joint stock association can only be formed when 

 the practicability of an oceanic canal capable 

 of receiving vessels of three or four hundred 

 tons, between the latitudes 7° and 18°, has been 

 proved, and the ground fixed upon and recog- 

 nised. I shall abstain from discussing the 

 question whether this ground " should form a 

 separate republic by the name of Junctiana, de- 

 pendant on the confederation of the United 

 States," as it has been recently proposed in 

 England, by a man whose intentions are always 

 the most praiseworthy and disinterested. But 

 whatever government may claim the soil on 

 which the great junction canal of the Ocean 

 shall be established, the benefit of this hydraulic 

 work ought to belong to every nation of both 

 worlds who shall have contributed to its execu- 

 tion by taking shares. The local governments 



