THE PANAMA CANAL.

Press, Volume XLIV, Issue 6786, 24 June 1887, Page 3

THE PANAMA CANAL.

Official accounts have reached Washington detailing a great cave in De Lessep s canal. Tiie slip was caused by underground currents of water which had been disturbed and diverted by the canal exea-_ yation. The work now stands about where it did before a spadeful of material was removed. The cut is filled in solidly for a long distance with earth and rock, the latter in great masses. The engineers are preparing to begin work on the Calebra cut, which it is calculated cannot be accomplished in less than six years. Mr A. Nelson Boyd, an English engineer, concludes an article on the canal in an English engineering paper as follows:— *' The impression made upon my mind by a visit to the canal is a sad one. It seems as if success was to be tarnished by a failure at Panama, and a brilliant reputation earned in the east lost in.the west. The Suez Canal has been followed too closely for work constructed under very different circumstances. The ditticulties were under-rated by the early surveyors, and the rate of wages miscalculated. Now there is uncertainty and hesitation about the plans to be adopted, and a tardy straining after economy."