THE SUEZ CANAL. 27 away in no time by the action of the water, especially if, as was commonly imagined, the level of the Red Sea waters was materially lower than that of the Mediterranean, and that therefore there would always be a strong current through the Canal. It was asserted that, as the walls crumbled away, the sand of which they were formed would sink to the bed of the trench and cause it to silt up. This view, I am bound to admit, was espoused by the leading English engineers of the day, with the well-nigh solitary exception of Sir John Hawkshaw. In Egypt the common belief was that, even if the Canal could be constructed, this could only be done at an enormous cost, and that, supposing it was done, the traffic through the Canal would be insufficient to pay any substantial interest on the cost of its construction. The opposition to the canal srheme had its headquarters ia. Tnglajxdj who used her then predominant influence at Constantinople to induce the Sultan, as Suzerain of Egypt, to discountenance the project.

It is the fashion nowadays to represent our opposition to the construction of the Suez Canal as proof of the narrowmindedness of our commercial classes, and as evidence of the lack of statesmanship of our rulers half a century ago. To me this attempt to prove that we are wiser than our fathers has always seemed to rest upon very shallow foundation. You . have only to look at the pamphlets and newspapers of the period to see that the piercing of the isthmus was desired on the one hand and deprecated on the