The Sun.
London, England, 1859-12-21 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

Try and _rot,' 117/77. A Story tier Youth. By Mr
Hart. With eight Cbloureil Engravings. Tegg.

That enterprising publisher, Mr. Tegg, is now
issuing a very excellent series of gift books
for the young. Very elegant in appearance, and
illustrated with brilliantly coloured engravings,
they are likely to captivate the juvenile reader at
first sight; and, from the interesting nature of
their contents, they are calculated to become
permanent favourites on a longer acquain-
tance. The new volume now happily issued as a
Christmas book is a favourable specimen of the
series. Its title indicates its significant purpose—
" Try and you Will." Never despair—never draw
back at the sight of difficulties, do not abandon the
good cause at the outset through cowardice or the
fear of failure. Will with all your might and act
with all your energy, and the forlorn hope will
scale the citadel—the Goliath will fall before a sling
and a pebble stone. Such is the admirable and
encouraging lesson, very admirably and effectively
set forth by Mrs. lart. Tier story has about it,
in its manner and details, the charm of freshness
and the merit of originality. We will not spoil its
interest by an epitome of its plot ; let us rather
commend Charles Gilbert, the backward school-
boy, and afterwards the energetic and successful
man, to the emulation of many a school-boy now
home for the holidays, who rejoices to escape from his
lessons—who "can't" get on with this, and "won't"
take any trouble with that, and promises to reward
the anxieties of his friends by a youth of idleness
and a life of disappointment. Let any such peruse
this enthralling history, and, encouraged by the ex-
ample before them, take up its motto, and Try !
Many others, girls and boys, will pass a pleasant
hour reading this charming history and admiring
its highly-coloured pictures. Let their friends only
gi-re them the chance. Let them " try," and we
doubt not they " will" like it !

THE WEAK POINT IN ENGLAND'S

CUIRASS.

A " Hertfordshire Incumbent," in a letter to a
contemporary, says :—The importance which the
question of the Suez Canal appears to have assumed
—induces me to request the insertion in your paper
of a few remarks on the scheme of M. Lesseps,
which, after all that has been said and done, pro-
bably not a hundred Englishmen qualified to form
a judgment on the matter have up to this time
taken the trouble to examine for themselves.
An impression has been formed abroad, and per-
haps confirmed by the unguarded language of some
of our leading statesmen, that the existence of the
ship canal is in itself thought prejudicial to British
interests, and advantage has been taken of this de-
lusion to place us in a most invidious light in the
eyes of other nations. But, if there has been any
jealousy of the matter in England, it has certainly
not arisen from the belief that a seaway through
Egypt, which, if it could be excavated and kept
open, would be traversed by four British ships for
one of every other country, could possibly be detri-
mental either to our interests or our influence.
Unhappily this proposed ship canal has to be
carried through a desert where neither food nor
water for the excavators is procurable, and, accord-
ingly, M. Lesseps's scheme contemplates as a pre-
liminary the execution of another work of at least
equal magnitude. This consists in the intercepting
a considerable portion of the water of the Nile near
Cairo, for the purpose of forming an auxiliary
fresh water canal, which, besides irrigating and
fertilising an enormous area of barren land, is to
throw off two principal branches, the one running
north-eastwards, the other south-westwards,
towards the extremities of the future ship canal.
These branches are to be utilised in supplying pot-
able water and furnishing the means of transport-
ing provisions for the workmen employed in cutting
the great canal.

It would not become me to speak of the special
engineering facilities or difficulties which may exist
for this preliminary step. But it is as well to point
out one feature of the plan which has not been put
prominently forward in any of the discussions which
have taken place. The works are to be executed by
forced labour at a fixed price, the Viceroy of Egypt
guaranteeing whatever number of native workmen
the engineers of the company may require, both (if
I understand M. Lesseps aright) for the completion
of this auxiliary fresh-water canal system and for
that of the great ship canal, which latter alone has
been taken up as a topic for discussion in the news-
papers. Now, the auxiliary canals will extend to a
length much more than double that of the ancient
canal of Neco, in excavating which 120,000 native
workmen perished. What are we to expect when
to this task the ship canal is also added ? The
native population of Egypt is probably at this mo-
ment not one-fifth of what it was in the time of the
Pharoahs ; if, therefore, the scheme be forced on in
its present shape, under the authority of all the
great continentafPowers, it will simply amount to
placing the directors of M. Lesseps's company in a
position to disorganize at their pleasure the whole
labour system of the country, and to oblige the
Viceroy to aid them in the creation of this anarchy
on pain of physical compulsion by the new quadri-
partite alliance. If any resistance to the scheme on
the part of the British Government has been con-
fined to the demand of security against sueh a result
as this, the charge of selfishness which has been
made against England will recoil upon its authors.
Our lively neighbours have much the advantage
of us in quickness of apprehension and -vividness
of imagination ; but, unfortunately, these very qua-
lities render them peculiarly liable to be carried
away by enthusiasm for any unpractical scheme
if pretending to the character of vastness. Of the
great engineering works of the last 30 years exactly
the most useless have most excited the admiration
of the French public, for among them the palm was
decidedly borne off by the Thames Tunnel—a sub-
ject of quite as passionate interest at the time it was
constructed as the Suez Canal is now, but which has
since been most truly described by some Persian
princes who visited it as " a device for making ships
pass over the heads of the people." The canal of
M. Lesseps, should it ever be executed, will elicit
from some ladji returning from Mecca af similar
description. description. It will probably remain open
oo
satruc-
half the number of years occupied
tion. The predominance of westeirnllyidtsarnieenwohritohh-
westerly winds produces a continual
will rapidly choke up its Mediterranean)oawerfiil
and inland an influence only lessbloiwn by the same
exercised by the movingmweinllthbe;
forcewinds
insuperableo ve r the surface ofl
h thessand
resources,desert.
the
b y engineera
herwil will
career
laste o
r ogfnature in anth will
halfl 1
turye marshw a n-
dering tribes camping_
ive
desolation,up the
eaenn dt:
a new legend wil atmheonregodthy
roundspri spring
aboutnl
will be said, inspired by an un-
controllable the Giaours,
which will mark the line of the canal. Four Kings
passion it
for shooting (as Nimrod of old
determined to convert the whole
for
the
chase),
this view they obtained by, space between
In
etwo seas into an enormous peli-
can preserve.
indeed,
their task effectually, as every man
magi-
cal arts the services of a crew of Gins, who per-
formed
may behold, but at the same time devoured all the
young men of the land of Egypt to give diem
strength for their gigantic task. Such will be the
mythical form of the history of the great Suez
Canal.