The American Type of Isthmian Canal Part 2

And, going back to the minority report of the Board of Consulting Engineers, we find that Mr. Joseph Ripley, the general superintendent at present in charge of the "Soo" Ca.n.a.l, and Mr. Isham Randolph, chief engineer of the sanitary district of Chicago, and thoroughly familiar with ca.n.a.l construction and management, both American engineers of much experience and high standing, p.r.o.nounce themselves in favor of a lock ca.n.a.l. When confronted by these facts, I for one would rely upon American engineers, American conviction and American experience, and accept the lock-ca.n.a.l proposition.

In this matter, as in all other practical problems, we may safely take the business point of view, and calculate without bias or prejudice the respective advantages and disadvantages; and the more thorough the method of reasoning and logic applied to the ca.n.a.l problem the more emphatic and incontrovertible the conclusion that the Congress should decide in favor of a plan which will give us a navigable waterway across the Isthmus within a measurable distance of time and with a reasonable expenditure of money, as opposed to a visionary theory of an ideal ca.n.a.l which may ultimately be constructed, possibly for the exclusive benefit of future generations, but at an enormous waste of money, time, and opportunity. I do not think we want to repeat at this late stage of the ca.n.a.l problem the fatal error of De Lesseps, who, when he had the opportunity in 1879 to make a choice of a practical waterway, being influenced by his great success at Suez, upon the most fragmentary evidence and in the absence of definite knowledge of actual conditions, decided beforehand in favor of a sea-level ca.n.a.l. It was largely his bias and prejudice which proved fatal to the enterprise and to himself.

I may recall that the so-called "international congress of 1879" was a mere subterfuge; that the opinions of eminent engineers, including all the Americans, were opposed to a sea-level project and in favor of a lock ca.n.a.l, but De Lesseps had made his plans, he had arrived at his decision, and in his own words, at a meeting of the American Society of Civil Engineers held in January, 1880, said, "I would have put my hat on and walked out if any other plan than a sea-level ca.n.a.l project had been adopted."

The situation to-day is very similar to the critical state of the ca.n.a.l question in 1902. What was then a question of choice of route is to-day a question of choice of plan. What was then a geographical conflict is to-day a conflict of engineering opinions. It has been made clear by the reference to the report of the Board of Consulting Engineers and by the testimony of the engineers before the Senate committee that the opinion of eminent experts is so widely at variance that there is little, if any, hope of an ultimate reconciliation. It is a choice of one plan or the other--of a sea-level or a lock ca.n.a.l. In respect to either plan a ma.s.s of testimony and data exists, which has been brought forward to sustain one view or the other. In respect to either plan there are advantages and disadvantages. The majority of the Senate Committee on Interoceanic Ca.n.a.ls have reported favorably a bill providing for the construction of a ca.n.a.l at sea level. From this majority opinion the minority of the committee emphatically and unequivocally dissent, and in their report they express themselves in favor of the lock ca.n.a.l.

The minority report calls attention to the changed conditions and requirements, which now demand a ca.n.a.l of much larger dimensions than originally proposed. Even as late as 1901 the depth of the ca.n.a.l prism was to be only 35 feet, against 40 to 45 feet in the project of only five years later. The bottom width has been increased from 150 to 200 feet and over. The length of the locks has been changed from 740 to 900 feet, and the width from 84 to 90 feet. These facts must be kept in mind, for they bear upon the questions of time and cost, and a sea-level or lock ca.n.a.l, as proposed to-day, is in all respects a very much larger affair, demanding very superior facilities for traffic, than any previous ca.n.a.l project ever suggested or proposed. This change in plans was made necessary by the Spooner act, which provides for a ca.n.a.l of such dimensions that the largest ship now building, or likely to be built within a reasonable period of time, can be accommodated.

Now, the estimated saving in money alone by adopting the lock plan--that is, on the original investment, to say nothing of acc.u.mulating interest charges--would be at least $100,000,000. Granting all that is said in favor of a sea-level ca.n.a.l, it is not apparent by any evidence produced that such a ca.n.a.l would prove a material advantage over a lock ca.n.a.l.

All its a.s.sumed advantages are entirely offset by the vastly greater cost and longer period of time necessary for construction, and I am confident that they would not be considered for a moment if the ca.n.a.l were built as a commercial enterprise. I do not think that they should hold good where the ca.n.a.l is the work of the nation, because a vast sum of money otherwise needed will be eventually sunk if the sea-level project is adopted, and entirely upon the theory that if certain conditions should arise _then_ it would be better to have a sea-level than a lock ca.n.a.l. We have never before proceeded in national undertakings upon such an a.s.sumption; we have never before, as far as I know, deliberately disregarded every principle of economy in money and time; we have never before in national projects attempted to conform to merely theoretical ideas, but we have always adhered to practical, hard common-sense notions of _what is best_ under the circ.u.mstances.

The majority of the committee attack the proposition that the proposed lock ca.n.a.l will have "locks with dimensions far exceeding any that have ever been made." If this principle were adopted in every other line of human effort all advancement would come to an end--even the ca.n.a.l enterprise itself--for, as it stands to-day, it far exceeds in magnitude any corresponding effort ever made by this or any other nation. They say that the proposed flight of three locks at Gatun would be objectionable and unsafe, but we have the evidence of American engineers of the highest standing, whose reputations are at stake, who are absolutely confident that these locks can be constructed and operated with entire safety. The committee say that "the entry through and exit from these contiguous locks is attended with very great danger to the lock gates and to the ships as well"; but if mere inherent danger of possible accidents were an objection there would be no great steamships, no great battleships, no great bridges and tunnels, no great undertakings of any kind.

The committee point out that accidents have occurred in the "Soo" Ca.n.a.l and in the Manchester Ship Ca.n.a.l; but the conditions, in the first place, were decidedly different, and, in the second place, they proved of no serious consequence as a hindrance to traffic and did no material injury to the ca.n.a.l. The "Soo" Ca.n.a.l has been in operation as a lock ca.n.a.l for some fifty years; it has been enlarged from time to time, and to-day accommodates a larger traffic than pa.s.ses through all other ship ca.n.a.ls of the world combined. It is a sufficient answer to the objections to say that this experience should have a determining influence in arriving at a conclusion, for the inherent problems of lock-ca.n.a.l construction are as well understood by American engineers as any other problems or questions in engineering science. The proposed deep waterway with a 30-foot channel from Chicago to tide-water, which has been surveyed by direction of Congress, proposes an expenditure of $303,000,000, and several locks with a lift of 40 feet or more. The enlargement of the Erie Ca.n.a.l by the State of New York, at an expenditure of $101,000,000, involves engineering problems, including lock construction, not essentially different from those inherent in the lock-ca.n.a.l project at Panama; and if these problems can be solved by our engineers at home, it stands to reason that we may rely upon their judgment that they can be solved at Panama.

The majority of the Senate committee object to the proposed dam at Gatun, and say that--

Earth dams founded on the drift and silt of ages, through which water habitually percolates, to be increased by the pressure of the 85-foot lock when made, have been referred to by many of our technical advisers as another element of danger. The vast ma.s.ses of earth piled on this alluvial base to the height of 135 feet will certainly settle, and as the drift material of this base or foundation has varying depth, to 250 feet or more, the settlement of the new ma.s.s, as well as its base, will be unequal, and it is predicted that cracks and fissures in the dam will be formed, which will be reached and used by the water under the pressure above mentioned, and will cause the destruction of the dam and the draining off of the great lake upon which the integrity of the entire ca.n.a.l rests.

But all of this is mere conjecture. The evidence of Engineer Stearns, a man of large experience, and of Engineer Harrod, familiar with river hydraulics and levee construction, and of many others, is emphatically to the contrary. There is not an American engineer of ability, nor an American contractor of experience, who would not undertake to build the proposed dam at Gatun and guarantee its safety and permanency without any hesitation whatever. The alternative proposal of a dam at Gamboa would be as objectionable upon much the same ground, and the dam there, which is indispensable to the sea-level project, has also been considered unsafe by some of the engineers. In all questions of this kind the aggregate experience of mankind ought to have greater weight than the abstract theories of individuals, and I am confident that our engineers, who have so successfully solved problems of the greatest magnitude in the reclamation projects of the far West and in the control and regulation of the floods of the Mississippi River, will solve with equal success similar problems at Panama.

The committee further says that the sea-level project contemplates the removal of some 110,000,000 cubic yards of material, while the lock ca.n.a.l would require the removal of only about half that quant.i.ty, or, in other words, that there is a difference of some 57,000,000 cubic yards, which, "to omit to take out ... is to confess our impotence, which is not characteristic of the American people or their engineers or contractors." By this method of reasoning a nation which can build a battleship of 16,000 tons displacement is impotent if it can not build one of twice that tonnage, and if this reason applies to quant.i.ty of material, why not say that a nation which can dig a ca.n.a.l 150 feet wide through a mountain some seven miles in length admits its impotence if it can not dig one 300 feet wide, or 600 feet, if it should please to do so? But why should it be less difficult or a declaration of impotency on the part of our engineers to build a safe lock ca.n.a.l including a satisfactory and safe controlling dam at Gatun? As I conceive the problem, it is one of reasonable compromise, and while I do not question the ability of American engineers and contractors to build a sea-level ca.n.a.l, I am convinced by the facts in evidence that they can not do it within the time and for the money a.s.sumed by the advocates of the sea-level project.

This question of _time_ is of supreme importance. Ten years in a nation's life is often a long s.p.a.ce in national history. Many times the map of the world has been changed in less than a decade. No man in 1890 antic.i.p.ated the war with Spain in 1898, and no man in 1906 can say what important event may not happen before the next decade has pa.s.sed. The progress during peace is far greater in its permanent effect than the changes brought about by war. The world's commerce, the social, commercial, and political development of the South American republics and of Asiatic nations, all depend, more or less, upon the completion of an Isthmian waterway. It is the duty of this nation, since we have a.s.sumed this task, to construct a waterway across the Isthmus within the shortest reasonable period of time. Valuable years have pa.s.sed, valuable opportunities have gone by. In 1884 De Lesseps, with supreme confidence and upon the judgment of his engineers, antic.i.p.ated the opening of the Panama Ca.n.a.l in 1888. That was nearly twenty years ago. Shall it be twenty years more before that greatest event in the world's commercial history takes place? Had De Lesseps in 1879 gone before the International Congress with a proposition for a feasible ca.n.a.l at reasonable cost, free from prejudice or bias, had he then adopted the American suggestion for a lock ca.n.a.l, he would probably have lived to see its completion, and the world for fifteen years would have had the use of a practical waterway across the Isthmus.

As to safety in operation, which the committee discuss in their report, there is one very important point to be kept in mind, and that is that nine-tenths, or possibly a larger proportion, of shipping will be of vessels of relatively small size. If this should be the case, then the sea-level project contemplates a ca.n.a.l chiefly designed to meet the possible needs of a very small number of vessels of largest size, while the lock ca.n.a.l provides primarily for the accommodation of the cla.s.s of steamships which of necessity would make the largest practical use of the Isthmian waterway. Now, it stands to reason that special precautions would be employed during the pa.s.sage of a very large vessel, either merchantman or man-of-war, and even if necessity should demand the rapid pa.s.sage of a fleet of vessels, say twenty or thirty, it is not conceivable that a condition would arise which could not be efficiently safeguarded against by those in actual charge and responsible for safety in the management of the ca.n.a.l. Considering the immense tonnage pa.s.sing through the "Soo" Ca.n.a.l, which would not be equaled in the Panama Ca.n.a.l for a century to come, the very few and relatively unimportant accidents which have occurred during the fifty years of operation of that waterway are in every respect the most suggestive indors.e.m.e.nt of the lock-ca.n.a.l project which could be advanced.

The time of transit, in the opinion of the majority committee of the Senate, would be somewhat longer in the case of a lock ca.n.a.l. This may be so, though much depends upon the cla.s.s of ships pa.s.sing through and their number. To the practical navigator the loss of a few hours would be a negligible quant.i.ty compared with the higher tolls that will necessarily be charged if an additional $100,000,000 is expended in construction and an additional interest burden of at least $2,000,000 per annum has to be provided for. I understand that the actual value of an hour or two in the case of commercial ships of average size would be a matter of comparatively no importance in contrast with the all-suggestive fact that the alternative project of a sea-level ca.n.a.l would provide no navigation whatever across the Isthmus for probably ten years more. If it is an advantage to gain an hour or two in transit ten years hence by having no transisthmian shipping facilities for the ten years in the meantime, then it might as well be argued that it would be better to project a sea-level ca.n.a.l 300 feet wide at every point, so that the commerce of the year 2000 may be properly provided for. But to the practical navigator of the year 1916, who leaves the port of New York for San Francis...o...b.. way of Cape Horn, a possible loss of two or three hours or more would be many times preferable, if the Isthmus were open for traffic, to a certain loss of from forty to fifty days to make the voyage all around South America.

Upon the question of cost of maintenance the majority committee in their report point out that the Board of Consulting Engineers did not submit the details of any estimate of cost of maintenance, repairs, etc., but they say that this factor was properly taken into account by the minority favoring a lock ca.n.a.l. Now, there is probably no more important question connected with the whole ca.n.a.l problem than this, for if the annual expense of maintenance, to be provided for by Congressional appropriations, should attain such an exorbitant figure as to make any fair return upon the investment impossible, it is conceivable that the most serious political and financial consequences might arise and the success of the enterprise itself might be placed in jeopardy. Upon a maximum cost, in round figures, of $200,000,000 for a lock ca.n.a.l, and of $300,000,000 as a minimum for a sea-level ca.n.a.l, the additional annual interest charge would be at least $2,000,000.

But Mr. Stearns estimates that under certain conditions a sea-level ca.n.a.l might cost as much as $410,000,000, which would add millions of dollars more per annum to the fixed charges which must be included in the cost of maintenance, to say nothing of a possibly much higher cost of operation. Nor can I agree to the statement that the cost of operation of a sea-level ca.n.a.l would be $800,000 per annum less than in the case of a lock ca.n.a.l; but, on the contrary, I am fully satisfied that the expense would be very much greater in the sea-level project, if proper allowance is made for interest charges upon the additional outlay, which cannot be rightfully ignored. Upon this important point the evidence of the engineers and of the minority members of the Board is strongly in favor of the lock-ca.n.a.l project.

As regards ultimate cost, the estimates of the majority are very much more indefinite and conjectural than the more carefully prepared estimates of the minority of the Board of Consulting Engineers. Upon this point the majority of the Senate committee say:

There are two estimates now before the Senate, both originating with the Board of Consulting Engineers. The basis of computation of cost at certain unit prices was adopted unanimously by the Board, and we are told that the cost, with the 20 per cent. allowance for contingencies, will be, for the sea-level ca.n.a.l, the sum of $247,021,200. Your committee has adopted the figures stated by the majority on page 64 of its report of a total of $250,000,000 for the ultimate final cost of the sea-level ca.n.a.l.

The estimate of the minority for a lock ca.n.a.l at a level of eighty-five feet is, in round figures, $140,000,000, or about $110,000,000 less than for a sea-level ca.n.a.l, which would represent a difference of $2,200,000 per annum in interest charges at the lowest possible rate of two per cent. The majority of the Senate committee attempt to meet this difference by capitalizing the estimated higher maintenance charge, which they fix at $800,000 per annum, and they thus increase the total cost of a lock ca.n.a.l by $40,000,000; but this, I hold, involves a serious financial error, unless a corresponding allowance is made for the ultimate cost of the sea-level project. There is, however, no serious disagreement upon the point that a sea-level ca.n.a.l in any event would cost a very much larger sum as an original outlay, certainly not less than $120,000,000 more, and, in all probability, in the opinion of qualified engineers, including Mr. Stevens, the chief engineer, twice that sum.

Reference is made in the report to the probable value of the land which will be inundated under the lock-ca.n.a.l project with a dam at Gatun, the value of which has been placed at approximately $300,000. The majority of the Senate committee estimate that this amount might reach $10,000,000, or as much as was paid for the entire Ca.n.a.l Zone. The estimate is based upon the price of certain lands required by the government near the city of Panama, but one might as well estimate the worth of land in the Adirondacks by the prices paid for real estate in lower New York. The item, no doubt, requires to be properly taken into account, but two independent estimates fix the probable sum at $300,000 for lands which are otherwise practically valueless and which would only acquire value the moment the United States should need them. In my opinion, the value of these lands will not form a serious item in the total cost of the ca.n.a.l, and I have every reason to believe that independent estimates of the minority engineers of the Consulting Board, and of Mr. Stevens, may be relied upon as conservative.

The majority of the Senate committee further say that--

It is not necessary to dwell upon the fact that all naval commanders and commercial masters of the great national and private vessels of the world are almost to a man opposed unalterably to the introduction of any lock to lift vessels over the low summit that nature has left for us to remove.

I am not aware that any material evidence of this character has come before the Senate Committee on Isthmian Affairs, investigating conditions at Panama. I do know this, however, that until very recently it has been the American project to construct a lock ca.n.a.l. All the former advocates of an American ca.n.a.l by way of Panama or Nicaragua, or by any other route, contemplated a lock ca.n.a.l of a much more complex character than the present Panama project. All the advocates of a ca.n.a.l across the Isthmus, including many distinguished engineers in the army and navy, have been in favor of a lock ca.n.a.l, and almost without exception have reported upon the feasibility of a lock ca.n.a.l across the Isthmus and upon its advantages to commerce and navigation, and in military and naval operations in case of war. The Nicaragua Ca.n.a.l, as recommended to Congress and as favored by the first Walker Commission, provided for a lock project far more complex than the proposition now under consideration.

Colonel Totten, who built the Panama railroad, recommended as early as 1857 the construction of a lock ca.n.a.l; Naval Commissioner Lull, who made a careful survey of the Isthmus in 1874, recommended a lock ca.n.a.l with a summit level of 124 feet and with 24 locks. Admiral Ammen, who, by authority of the Secretary of War, attended the Isthmian Congress of 1879, favored a lock project, in strong opposition to the visionary plan of De Lesseps. Admiral Selfridge and many other naval officers who have been connected with Isthmian surveying and exploration have never, to my knowledge, by as much as a word expressed their apprehensions regarding the feasibility or practicability of a lock ca.n.a.l.

As a matter of fact and ca.n.a.l history, the lock project has very properly been considered "an American conception of the proper treatment of the Panama ca.n.a.l problem." Mr. C.D. Ward, an American engineer of great ability, as early as 1879 suggested a plan almost identical with the one now recommended by the minority of the Consulting Board, including a dam at Gatun, instead of Bohio or Gamboa; and, in the words of a former president of the American Society of Civil Engineers, Mr.

Welsh, "The first thought of an American engineer on looking at M. De Lesseps' raised map is to convert the valley of the lower Chagres into an artificial lake some twenty miles long by a dam across the valley at or near a point where the proposed ca.n.a.l strikes it, a few miles from Colon, such as was advocated by C.D. Ward in 1879." The site referred to was Gatun, and this was written in 1880, when the sea-level project had full sway.

So that it is going entirely too far to say that all naval commanders and commercial masters are in favor of the sea-level project. Admiral Walker himself, as president of the former Isthmian Commission, and as president of the Nicaraguan Board, favored a lock ca.n.a.l. Eminent army engineers, like Abbot, Hains, Ernst, and others, favor the lock project.

It requires no very extensive knowledge of navigation to make it clear that pa.s.sing through a waterway which for 35 miles, or 71 per cent. of its distance, will have a width of 500 feet or more, compared with one which, for the larger part, or for some forty-one miles, will have a width of only 200 feet or less, must appeal to the sense of security of the skipper while taking his vessel through the ca.n.a.l.

But it is a question of general principles, and not of personal preference. Our concern is with a matter of fact, and not with a theory.

No ship-owner on the Great Lakes considers it a serious hindrance to navigation for vessels to pa.s.s through the lock of the "Soo" Ca.n.a.l; no shipper running 1,000-ton barges through the future Erie Ca.n.a.l will have the least apprehension of danger or destruction; no captain navigating a vessel or boat through the proposed deep waterway from the ocean to the Lakes will hesitate to pa.s.s through locks with a proposed lift of over forty feet. These apprehensions are imaginary and not real. They are not derived from experience or from a summary statement of shipmasters and naval officers, but from the individual expressions and prejudice of a few who are opposed to the lock project. I am confident that if the matter is left to the practical navigator, to the ship-owner, and to the self-reliant naval officer, there will be no serious disagreement with the opinion that a lock ca.n.a.l, which can be built within a reasonable period of time, is preferable to any sea-level ca.n.a.l which may be built and opened to navigation twenty years hence or later.

There are two objections made by the majority of the Senate committee against a lock ca.n.a.l which require more extended consideration. These are, the protection of the ca.n.a.l in case of war and the danger of serious injury or total destruction by possible earth movements or so-called "earthquakes." Regarding the military aspects of the ca.n.a.l problem, the majority of the Senate committee say:

The Spooner act and the Hay-Varilla treaty contemplated the fortification and military protection of the ca.n.a.l route. No proposition affecting this policy is now before the Senate. In so far as the type of ca.n.a.l to be adopted has a bearing upon the jeopardy to or immunity of the ca.n.a.l from risk of malicious injury, the subject of safety and protection is pertinent and most important. If a ca.n.a.l of one type would be more liable to injury than another, this liability should under no circ.u.mstances be neglected in determining the type or plan. It does not require argument that the use of the ca.n.a.l by the United States will cease if the control pa.s.ses to a hostile power between which and the United States a state of war exists, but this is true whatever the type may be.

As the majority of the committee point out, "no proposition affecting this project is now before the Senate." In my opinion, none is necessary. The neutrality of the ca.n.a.l is, by implication at least, a.s.sured, and we have pledged our national good faith that the waterway will be open to all the nations of the world. Some time in the future, when the ca.n.a.l is completed and an accepted fact, it may be advisable to adopt the course pursued in the case of the Suez Ca.n.a.l. The original concession for that ca.n.a.l provided, by section 3, for its subsequent fortification, but this was never carried into effect. By a convention dated December 22, 1888, among Great Britain, Germany, and other nations, the free navigation of the Suez Ca.n.a.l was made a matter of international agreement, and the same has been reprinted as Senate Doc.u.ment No. 151, Fifty-sixth Congress, first session, under date of February 6, 1900.

This, in any event, is a problem of the future. The ca.n.a.l is the property of the United States, and we shall always retain control. In the event of war we shall rely with confidence upon our navy to protect our interests on the Pacific and in the Caribbean Sea, but even more may we rely upon the all-important fact that it could never be to the interest of any other nation sufficient in size to be at war with us to destroy this international waterway, which will become an important necessity to the commerce of each and all. No neutral nation engaged in extensive commerce or trade would for an instant allow another nation at war with the United States to injure or destroy the ca.n.a.l or to seriously interfere with the traffic pa.s.sing through it. To destroy as much as a single lock, to injure as much as a single gate, would be considered equal to an act of war by every commercial nation of the earth. In this simple fact lies a greater a.s.surance of safety than in all the treaties which might be made or in all the fortifications which might be established to protect the ca.n.a.l.

The majority of the committee well say in their report, that the power of mischief "is within easy reach of all." The possibility of an a.s.sumed occurrence is very remote from its reasonable probability. We have to rely upon our own good faith and the watchful eyes of our officers.

Against possible contingencies, such as are implied in the a.s.sumed destruction of the locks by dynamite or other high explosives, we can do no more than take the same precautions which we take in all other matters of national importance. We have to take our chances the same as any other nation would; the same as commercial enterprise would.

Certainly the remote possibility of such an event, the still more remote contingency that the injury would be serious or fatal to the operation of the ca.n.a.l, should not govern in a decision to construct a ca.n.a.l for the use of the present generation rather than for the generations to come. No ca.n.a.l can be built free from vulnerable points; no forts, no battleships, can be built free from such a risk. It would be folly to delay the construction of a ca.n.a.l; it would be folly to sink a hundred million dollars or more upon so remote a contingency as this, which belongs to the realm of fanciful or morbid imagination rather than to the domain of substantial fact and actual experience.

As a last resort, the opposition to a lock ca.n.a.l brings forward the earthquake argument. It is a curious reminder of the early and bitter opposition to the building of the Suez Ca.n.a.l; its enemies had to fall back upon the absurd theory that the ca.n.a.l would prove a failure because the blowing sands of the desert would soon fill the channel. It was seriously proposed to erect a stone wall four feet high on each side of the embankment to provide against this imaginary danger to the ca.n.a.l.

Another early objection to the Suez Ca.n.a.l was that the Red Sea level was 30 feet above the level of the Mediterranean, only set at rest in 1847 by a special commission, which included Mr. Robert Stephenson, the great son of a great father, bitter to the last in his opposition to the ca.n.a.l, which he considered an impracticable engineering scheme. There was much talk about the a.s.sumed prevalence of strong westerly winds on the southern Mediterranean coast, and the danger of constantly increasing deposits of the Nile, it was said, would render the establishment of a port impossible. It was necessary to place a war-ship for a whole winter at anchor three miles from the sh.o.r.e to prove the error of this a.s.sumption and set at rest a foolish rumor which came near proving fatal to the enterprise.

Earthquakes have occurred on the Isthmus, and there is record of one shock of some consequence in 1882. The matter has been inquired into in a general way by the various Isthmian commissions, and a.s.sumed some prominence during the discussions and debates regarding a choice of routes. It was plain to even the least informed that the volcanic belt of Nicaragua const.i.tuted a real menace to a ca.n.a.l in that region; and one of the strongest arguments advanced in the minority report of the Senate committee of 1902, submitted by Senator Kittredge, now a leading advocate of the sea-level project, in opposition to the Nicaragua Ca.n.a.l, was the a.s.sertion of the practical freedom of the Panama Isthmus from the danger of earth movements.

The minority of the Senate committee of 1902 in their report, summing up the final reasons in favor of the Panama route (section 12), said:

At Panama earthquakes are few and unimportant, while the Nicaraguan route pa.s.ses over a well-known coastal weakness. Only five disturbances of any sort were recorded at Panama, all very slight, while similar official records at San Jose de Costa Rica, near the route of the Nicaragua Ca.n.a.l, show for the same period fifty shocks, a number of which were severe. (P. 11, S. Rep. 783, part 2, 57th Cong., 1st session, May 31, 1902.)

In another part of their report the committee said:

With the dreadful lessons of Martinique and St. Vincent fresh in our minds, we should be utterly inexcusable if we deliberately selected a route for an Isthmian ca.n.a.l in a region so volcanic and dangerous, when a route is open to us which is exposed to none of these dangers and is in every other respect more advantageous.

And they quote Professor Heilprin, an authority on the subject, in part, as follows:

It has, however, been known for a full quarter of a century that the main Andes do not traverse the Isthmus of Panama, and that there are no active or recently decayed volcanoes in any part of the Isthmus. So far, however, as danger from direct volcanic contacts is concerned, the Panama route is exempt. (Pp. 22-23.)

And further:

This district represents the most stable portion of Central America. No volcanic eruptions have occurred there since the end of the Miocene epoch, and there are no active volcanoes between Chiriqui and Tolima, a distance of about four hundred miles. Such earthquakes as have occurred are chiefly those proceeding from the disturbed districts on either hand, with intensity much diminished by the distance traversed. The ca.n.a.l lies in a sort of dead angle of comparative safety.

The report continues:

The situation being, then, that the danger from volcanoes at Panama is nothing, and that from earthquakes practically nothing, while at Nicaragua the ca.n.a.l would be situated in one of the most dangerous regions of the world from both these causes, the question should be considered settled.

This was the opinion of the committee of 1902; it was emphatic and plain in its language; it had considered expert views and the available data.

It had before it the full report of the Nicaragua Ca.n.a.l Commission, printed under date of May 15th of the same year, Chapter VII of which considers the subject at much greater length than has been done since that time and with a full knowledge of the facts and free from bias or prejudice. With the then recent occurrence at Mount Pelee in mind, and with a full understanding of the liability of the Isthmus to seismic shocks of minor importance, the committee emphatically indorsed the lock-ca.n.a.l project at Panama.