6 cations to Oxus and down to the Caspian Sea, navigation to the Volga, transportation again across the country to the Tanais, thence to the Euxine, with a reshipment there. Precious indeed must be the trade which can flourish amid all these obstacles! As facilities of intercourse with the East, however, increased after the discoveries of the Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch and English, we find the European trade with Asia prodigiously augmented. In the best days of Venice (A. D. 1400) this trade did not exceed 20,000,000 ducats, Whereas including or require above 600 ships of 600 tons each, America now, according to a report made to Congress, by Mr. Breese, and adding for increase since his dates, and value of ships engaged, the whole commerce of the East with all the world, annually, may be estimated at 300,000,000 of dollars, requiring 2,000 ships. Indies. He furnishes the following interesting table of distances to be saved by the Panama route. TABLE I-Statement of the number of vessels, amount of tonnage and crews, which entered and cleared at the ports of the following countries from and to ports beyond the Cape of Good Hope and the Pacific. TABLE II.-Value of trade conducted by above shipping. Antwerp, no statistics but estimated on number of ships United States, from whale fishery, for 1845: ...... 1,065,018 Add overland Russia with China.. 146,814,165.... .78,871,063 12,048,055.... 7,581,295 Total.... .$158,862,220....86,452,358 ...... The number of vessels employed in trade beyond the Cape of Good Hope is estimated at 2,000, of the value $60,000,000. Passengers to and from Bombay and England annually, about 4,000, paying from 5 to 900 dollars each, and occupying 40 to 50 days.* Extra baggage $15 per hundred pounds. English mails to Bombay and China $2,000,000, making $4,000,000 expended annually in passengers and mail to the East. Now there can be little doubt that the trade with eastern countries is susceptible of almost unlimited extension, were their distance lessened one-half, or two-thirds, and the time of travel reduced in a similar proportion. Many new products would then endure transportation which are now too perishable or bulky. The travel also would be increased. In truth there would be added millions and hundreds of millions of eastern consumers. The Sandwich Islands are but in their infancy. There are a million and one-half Polynesian Islanders; Celebs contains 3 millions; and Java 5 or 6 millions, who export $30,000,000 annually to Holland. Sumatra, with a population of 2,000,000, exports 30,000,000 pounds spices. Borneo, with 3 to 4 millions, exports gold, This of course is by the overland route by Gibraltar, Alexandria, Cairo Suez, the Red Sea, etc. In a late number of Chambers's Miscellany is described the route, 39 or 40 days, and the expense £120. $609, from Southampton to Bombay. tin, antimony, and diamonds. The Phillipines, have 3,500,000, producing sugar, coffee, indigo, hemp. Singapore is the center of Indian trade; India contains 184,000,000 inhabitants, including Cabul and Affghanistan, Calcutta, Bombay, Madras, Ceylon, etc., with a commerce of $150,000,000 annually. Australia is an infant, but promising, colony. Russian America, now unimportant, Manchoo Tartary, and the great Sanghalin river, 4,000 miles long, connecting with Pekin; Japan, with 50,000,000 people and the richest products, now almost closed to commerce; China, 360,000,000 inhabitants, on the coast 274,000,000, with its Chang-hee, or Shang-hai, at the mouth of the mighty Yangtsee-keang, 4,000 miles long, the Mississippi of China. Can it be imagined that these vast regions, so densely populated, have already reached the acme of their foreign trade, or is it, not plausible, when better systems of intercourse are opened, jealousies removed, and civilization extended, that trade with them will be augmented two or three fold, reaching, perhaps, in the aggregate, five to eight millions of dollars? Instead of two thousand travelers visiting the East, per annum, in such a contingency, would not the number reach nearer twenty thousand, which, at half the present rates of travel, would realize six or eight millions of dollars? The question occurs again, how can we connect ourselves with the Pacific by a route so advantageous, in every respect, as will enable us to command, if not to monopolize, its commerce, and augment it in the manner indicated? And this brings us to a historical consideration of the various projects, past and present, looking to a connection between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. In the search of a western and shorter passage to India, Columbus discovered the American continent, as the Portuguese had skirted along Africa and doubled the Cape for an eastern passage. The Portuguese rested in their brilliant discoveries, and in the wealth which they brought. Spain, on the contrary, still sought the nearer route, and explored the American continent, in the hope of finding some strait or channel through it to India. She sought in vain in the extreme North; about the Isthmus of Panama; along the Mexican coasts, and throughout the extent of all South America; finding, however, the Straits of Magellen, and ultimately, though long afterward, Cape Horn. These were far from presenting the much desired advantage. No sooner had Cortez been securely established in Mexico, than he commenced anew the search, with the greatest minuteness, throughout all the coast. He wrote to the Emperor: "I have received information as well of the riches of the country, as that, in the opinion of many navigators, there exists a strait leading to the opposite sea." He writes again: "Should we, with the Divine assistance, so hit upon this strait, that the navigation from the spice countries (the East Indies) to the kingdom of your Majesty would become excellent and shorter, so much so that it would be two-thirds less than the present navigation, and without any danger to the ships in going or coming," etc., etc. The Spaniards appeared, at last, satisfied in this quarter, and sent out expeditions to north-west of America, in the hope of greater success there. In one of these was explored the Gulf of California, and in another Friar Marcos asserted the discovery of regions, which no one afterward could find, northwest of Mexico, beyond 35° of latitude, abounding in gold, silver, precious stones, and a civilized population!* The final conclusion was, that no navigable passage existed South of the latitude of 40°, and soon, says Mr. Greenhow, the Spanish policy maintained, "the discovery of any passage, facilitating the entrance of European vessels into the Pacific, would be deleterious to the power and interest of Spain in the New World." t About the middle of the sixteenth century, a direct commerce was opened between the Spanish East India possessions and Mexico. For the first time Europeans crossed the Pacific in direct voyages from Asia to America. "Large ships, called galleons, sailed annually from Acapulco to Manilla in the Phillipines, and to Macao and China, laden with precious metals and European merchandize; in return for which they brought back silks, spices and porcelain, for consumption in America, or for transportation over the Atlantic to Europe; while an extensive trade, in articles equally valuable, was carried on between Panama and the various ports of Peru and Chili." The English now appear upon the theater; and, jealous of the lucra tive branch of commerce which has sprung up, the buccaniers, under Drake and Cavendish, infest the waters of the western world. To this period may be traced the ingenious fictions of a passage in the northwest, through the continent, so long credited and known, even upon the maps, as the Straits of Anian, or of Fuca. Between the years 1600 and 1760 the search was continued, with various interest, and resulted in the discovery of Baffin's Bay and Hudson's Straits. Near the close of the eighteenth century, the English, Spanish and American navigators made frequent expeditions to the northwest, and their respective discoveries became a question of keen and lively interest and discussion but lately, in the settlement of the vexata questio of Oregon. The English chapter exhibits the results of Alexander McKensie, one of her citizens, who traversed British America, from Canada to the Pacific, being in search of an inland route across the continent. The Sieur de la Salle entertained the idea, as his dispatches will show, that, by following the Mississippi to its sources, a communication. could be had with the waters of the Oregon and the Pacific, and the commerce of the East commanded by France, through her province of Louisiana.t Thomas Jefferson, two hundred years later, and soon after the Louisiana purchase, following the idea of La Salle, dispatched Lewis and Clarke on an expedition to the northwest, by the way of the Mississip pi, to find, if possible, a route of commercial communication to the Pacific. So much, then, for the history of this interesting subject, and now for the various projects of our own day, toward the accomplishment of the same great end. They are either, I. By CANAL, or II. By RAILROAD. *Was this California? Vid. Spark's La Salle. Hist. Oregon and California, p. 65. Lewis and Clarke's Expedition, vol. 1. Of each there are several routes proposed, with various degrees of merit, which it is our present purpose to examine. And first, as to canals. These are, 1. By the Isthmus of Panama, or Darien. 2. By the Lake of Nicaragua. 3. By the River Atrato, from the Gulf of Darien. 4. By the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. Others, less practicable, were proposed by Humboldt, but we shall consider now only those of Panama, Nicaragua, and Tehuantepec. 1. PANAMA. This is the narrow neck of land connecting the two Americas; in the province of New Grenada; between the parallels of 8° and 11° north latitude; varying in breadth from twenty-eight to forty-eight miles, and with a population of 7,200. The Andes afford many gaps, or passages, and the country presents no insurmountable obstacles to a canal, which it is estimated may be built for $40,000,000. The late conquest of California has given an interest to Panama, far greater than it has previously had. Lines of steamers constantly ply from northern ports to Chagres, on the Atlantic, and other lines from Panama, on the Pacific, to San Francisco and Oregon. Little difficulty is found by passengers over the isthmus, who are conveyed more than half the way in canoes. We have seen the most glowing accounts of the expedition, the scenery and aspect of the country, even from the pens of delicate females. The rigors of the climate and the rainy season have been greatly exaggerated. 2. NICARAGUA. This lake is situated between 11° and 12° north latitude; its extent is large, and its navigable waters are carried to the Carribean sea by the river San Juan--navigable during the rains, according to McCulloch, throughout its whole extent. Four to twelve feet water is always afforded in the Rio Juan, and it is proposed to improve its navigation, or to construct a canal from the Lake Nicaragua, which is adapted to ships of largest burthen, to the Pacific, fifteen and three-fourths miles, through a country elevated, in general, not more than nineteen feet. The level of the lake is one hundred and thirtyfour feet above the Pacific, and the difference in level between the two oceans is twenty or twenty-two feet. For a canal, there must be one mile of tunnel, and two miles of deep cutting through volcanic rock, and also a great number of locks. Mr. Bailey, under direction of the State of Nicaragua, made a survey in 1837-8, and estimated the cost of a canal at about $30,000,000. 3. TEHUANTEPEC. The Rio Guascecualco has its mouth in the Mexican province of Vera Cruz, seven hundred miles from the mouth of the Mississippi river. The route across the Isthmus follows the course of the river as far as Tarifa, at which town a canal or rail-road will begin, passing into the western lakes which are discharged into the Pacific. The width of the Isthmus in this part is one hundred and thirtyfive miles, and its central mountainous chain exhibits a depression in the line of the route. For twenty-five miles a plain is formed, whose streams flow North and South. There are passes or gates here, such as Chivola and Tarifa. The northward streams enter the Guascecualco-the southern, the Chiapa, which is discharged in the lake east of Tehuantepec, on the Pacific. We have before us the survey and charts |