Читать книгу Is a Ship Canal Practicable? онлайн

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In selecting from material, much of which bears little relation to the questions at issue, many objects may be omitted which deserve notice, and some may be noticed which might have been omitted.

If serious attention is attracted to this important project, the writer will have attained his object.

“There does not exist in the libraries of the world,” observes Admiral Davis, “the means of determining, even approximately, the most practicable route for a ship canal across the Isthmus.” This deficiency in our geographical knowledge will shortly be supplied. An exploration is now in progress, under the auspices of Government.

If a practicable route is found, there is reason to believe that execution will follow as certainly as the settlement of America followed its discovery.

We may not unreasonably expect the progress of the future to keep pace with the past, and that the absolute increase of the commercial marine, and an enlarged area for its operations, will lead to a proportionate extension of the beneficent influences of religion and civilization. The speculation opens a prospect of the future destiny of intertropical America; destined, perhaps, to produce as great a revolution on our globe as the colonization of America.