NAVIGATION INLAND.
THE subjects treated in this article, including what relates to rivers and lakes, being extremely various, we have considered the term Canal as too limited an expres sion, and have therefore chosen that of Inland Naviga tion, as more appropriate and comprehensive.
The advantages derived from inland navigation are now so generally known and acknowledged, that the statement of a very few facts seems quite sufficient to show its utility.
1. When bulky articles, or those of great weight, are to be moved with great regularity in a short time, inland navigation is the best mode in which this can be accom plished.
2. Agriculture and manufactures profit equally ; and the country at large is, by this means, at all times assur ed of an equal and ready distribution of food and fuel. By diminishing the number of draught horses also, a greater proportion of the produce of the earth is appropriated to the support of man ; and the facility or conveyance af fords the means of opening districts which would other wise remain unimproved.
3. The capital saved in the article of transport is, of course, appropriated to more productive labour. To convey 20 tons upon a narrow canal, the horse and boat generally cost about 100/. and require only one man and a boy. To carry the same weight by land, more than 20 such horses are required, and at least 10 men. The land establishment would therefore cost at least tcn times the expense of that by the canal, under a proportion ably greater tear and wear.
4. Againstthis saving is to be put only the original pro per extra cost of the canal and its appendages, over that of a turnpike road and its bridges and other works. The results may be distinctly ascertained, by considering., that the total expense of carriage upon canals is only about one-third of that by land, besides its enabling much larger quantities to be conveyed over the same space in the same time ; so that whenever an industrious popula tion has increased to a certain extent, this mode of con veyance has invariably been resorted to.
5. The intimate connection between inland navigation, and irrigation and draining, has likewise operated pow erfully in promoting the former, as will be seen in the following treatise.
The banks and shores of rivers and lakes being fre quented by men in the earliest stages of society, the hollowed trunk of a tree, or wicker baskets covered vvith the hides of animals, formed the boats of the first navigators ; and of these rude vessels, the Indian canoe, and river coracle, are true specimens. Between these first simple operations, and the construction of perfect artificial canals, much time niust have elapsed, the poli tical state of society must have improved, and various mechanical aits have reached a considerable degree of perfection. The earliest operations of this kind, indeed, commenced by protecting the low lands adjacent to the mouths of great rivers, and by directing the flood watcrs for the purposes of agriculture ; so that the drains fir,t employed were afterwards found to afford the means of inland navigation. It was therefore .in the Deltas of the Nile, and the Euphrates, the Great Chinese Rivers, and the Estuaries of the Po and the Rhine, that systems o! this kind were first established.
Of Egyt,t.
Ancient historians, although they have all expressed, in general terms, their admiration of the canals of this country, have conveyed no distinct information respect ing their dimensions, shape, or mechanical distribution, and their observations had always more immediate refer ence to the purposes of agriculture.
The following are the only distinct particulars we have been able to collect, viz. that its navigation consisted of, 1st. The river Nile; 2clly, The artificial canals in Upper and Lower Egypt ; and, 3dly, 'The Great Canal, between the Nile and the Red Sea.
All that regarded this river was so intimately con nected with the mythology of the country, as to have religious ceremonies attcndant upon all its operations ; and we have in their hieroglyphics the shape of the barks anciently employed.