PANAMA CANAL. The projected ship canal across the Isthmus of Palla11111, vonnecting the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. The first project for the construction of such a canal to result in the actual beginning of the work grew out of a concession granted by the 1;overnment of Colom bia to Lieut. Lucien N. B. Wyse and others in May, 1878. giving to them the exclusive privi lege, for 99 years, of constructing and operating a canal across the territory of the Republic between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. An international congress of 135 di-legates, mostly engineers, 11 being from the trniteil States, was held at Paris in 1879, under the auspices of Ferdinand de Lessees, who had been induced to assume the leadership in the and after a session of two weeks decided that the route for the canal should be aero-s the 14Innui of Panama, between the cities of Coli'M and Panama, and that the canal should be a sea level one and without locks. For the purpose of construction the Panama Canal Company, offi cially known as the 'Compagnie du Canal Inter-oc6anique de Panama.' was Organized under the laws of France with Lesseps as president. it purchased the Wyse concession for 10,000,001) francs, and at once entered upon the task of surveying the route and doing other pre liminary work. The plan adopted provided for a sea-level canal 29.5 feet in depth. with a bottom width of 72 feet, involving an excavation of 157.000,001) cubic yards of earth and rock. The estimated cost of construction, as ealettlated by Lesseps, was 8127,000,000, and the time required was estimated at eight years, both of which estimates were considerably under those made by the International Congress. Work was begun in 1881, but in a short time it became evident that the undertaking involved diflieulties which had not been foreseen, and that the estimates wire absurdly low. In order to obtain additional funds and to retain the confidence of the French public, bribery on an almost unprecedented scale was resorted to. prominent newspapers \left' •-1111 sidized, and a number of members of the French Chamber of Deputies were corrupted. In 1892
many of the transactions of the company or its became known to the public, and the dis closures, implicating a number of the most prom inent men in France, gave rise to perhaps the greatest financial seandal in French history. The company was declared to be bankrupt. and it was found, on examination. that up to this time. 1,300,000,000 francs had been expended: that the assets of the company amounted to only 700,000. 00O francs, and that only a small part of the work had been done. The company was dissolved by the French courts and a receiver etas ap pointed to take charge of its affairs. The receiver was authorized to cede to any new company all or a part of the assets and to borrow and make contracts with a view to completing the work of construction. Ile asked for and received from the Government of Colombia three suc cessive ext aisions of time Within Whicln U10 'anal was to be C011111101.d and pill into operation. The last extension gave the until MO to complete the work. The reeeiver finally sne eeeded in October. 1$94. in organizing the new Panama Company. with a eapital stock of 650.000 of 1)10 francs each (about 813.00,000), the Government of Colombia subscribing for 50,000 shares. The property and assets of the old Panama Company were now transferred to the new Panama Company. An international tech nical commission composed of ten eminent en gineers, representing the United States, Great Britain, Germany. and France, was appointed to investigate the subject, and in November. 1S99, reported unanimously in favor of the feasibility and practicability of completing the canal. They reported that the canal was already two-fifths completed, that not more than $102.400,000 would he needed to finish the work, and that the time need not exceed ten years. The work of construction was then resumed on a small scale. Up to ,bine 30, 1899, the new company had ex pended about $8,000,000 and had excavated about 5,000,000 cubic yards of earth.