in such a way that the level of the water in the canal will be regulated by that of the Atlantic, which varies but very little.
With these two modifications that we have pointed out to the plan of Messrs, Wyse and Reclus, and in fixing at four kilometres the greatest length of the tunnel—which can probably be reduced in length when the work is actually in hand, and perhaps be entirely done away with by a deep cut—your first sub-committee, over-estimating perhaps the expense calculated, brings the sum total to somewhat less than eleven hundred million francs, including the interest on the capital embarked during the time of construction, and the working expenses capitalized at five per cent. I feel confident that this figure will not be exceeded, and I am even confident that it will not be reached. Indeed, it is well known that the building of the railroad from Colon (Aspinwall) to Panama did not cost much more than such a work would had it been done in Europe; and here we shall have to aid us in putting up the great workshops of the canal, at short notice, a railroad already built, which is in excellent running order from one end to the other, and has a good harbor on either side.
I have said enough to show, I think—and here is the second point in the programme of my address—that, whatever may be the plan adopted, canal with locks or canal on a tide-level, it is from the Bay of Colon to the Gulf of Panama that it should go.
Comparison of the Tide-level Canal with the Lock-Canal.—Let us now compare the relative advantages of these two systems. In a technical point of view the preceding discussion would seem to make any further development superfluous. Moreover, have we not heard, in the first sittings of the committee, M. Cotard himself, an advocate, I believe, of the former system, declare without contradiction that, if the tide-level canal was possible and could be made to pay, it would be preferable to one with locks? Have we not heard and applauded the report of M. Fontane, the General Secretary of the Suez Canal Company, in which he tells you, in behalf of the Committee on Statistics, of which he is a member, that a tide-level canal is the only one that can supply the demands of the navigation of the entire world?
After having shown that the construction of a tide-level canal is possible, and under what conditions it is possible and assured, it would only remain to prove that it would pay. Here the fine report of M. Levasseur, in behalf of the Committee on Statistics, a report which you heartily applauded at the last meeting of the Congress, makes my task an easy one. The report declares and proves that, at the time when the canal should be opened, it can reasonably count upon a commerce of more than seven million tons. Very well, the Suez Canal, which cost almost five hundred million francs, with three million tons only, and subjected to demands which the Interoceanic Canal will not have to undergo, is proposing a diminution of its charges to only seven or eight francs for actual tonnage, a tariff which could easily be dou-
