Ashtabula telegraph. (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1874-1880, 1879-08-15
PARIS LETTER.
The Late Napoleon HI and the Pam
anna Canal Scheme.
Regular Corresponding.

IC5uldA correspondence
NJ. de Lesseps, it is well known, is re-
solved to strive his utmost to crown the
edifice Of his long and splendidly useful
life by carrying out that Panama Canal
scheme, which, to all practical intents and
purposes he has made his own. He can
didly told his hearers that, as in the con-
structIon Of the Suez Canal, he himself
would be solely responsible to the public.
He asks for capital of one hundred mill
ious of francs, or four millions sterling, to
begin with; just the sum asked for thirty
years ago by the Imperial Pretender tenn
porarily residing in King street, st. James.
The caution money of two millions reuuir-
ed by the Government Of Venezuela, for
the territory of that Republic has the ven-
ue of the projected canal been shifted, has
already been paid; and NJ. de Lessepe
thinks that the total cost of making the
canal will not exceed seven hundred and
fifty millions of francs, and that it can be
completed in eight years. NJ. de Lessepe
mentioned incidentally in a recent address
to the French Geographical Society that
Prince Louis Napoleon, during his impris-
onment in the Fortress of Ham, had
thought much of Panama Canal, and had
sent an officer, devoted to the Bonapartist
cause, to explore the Istmus. The officers
report being favorable, he (the Prince)
wrote the French Ministry asking to be
set at liberty IN order that he might devote
himself to the realization Of his scheme,
and promising never to meddle with pcli-
tics again. No reply was given to his pc
titiOn, and he afterwards escaped and
went to London with view to carry out
his project. =
He was just preparing to start for Amer
lea when the Revolution of 1S48 caused him
to alter his intentions" Two years later
the prisoner Of Ham was Emperor of
France, and the ''Canal Napoleon de Nj
cargua" was relegated to the limbo of the
things that might have been. Yes, that
might have been. The history of the Bona
rarte family has been chain of such un-
expected, such astonishing and such in
congruous events that speculation may be
permissible IN what might haYe been, his
torlcally, had the prisoner of 1856. had
the exile IN London in 1S47 been able to
carry out his project of Nicaraguan Can
al. Anything and all things may be ex-
pected from family which, from the small
beginnings OF petty advocate and a wine
growers daughter in Corsica, has, in the
course of seyenty-five years, allied itself
win almost every Imperial house in Eu-
rope, which has counted among its mem
bers two actual and two potential Emper-
ors, Kings and Queens by the half-dozen,
and Prince and Princesses by the score,
who, IN three generations have undergone
the most extraordinary vicissitudes-this
Princess keeping a boarding-school in the
United States, that Prince marrying mil
liner, such side branch as the Bonaparte-
PatterSons becoming American citizens,
wealthy country gentlemen, or prosperous
lawyers in Pennsylvania, this grand nephew
of Napoleon |. wearing the uniform of
cadet at WOolwich, that donning the pur-
pie Of a Prince of the Church. What
things might have been had Napoleon III
become managing director of the Nicara-
guam Canal. The magic of his name might
have raisen to the Presidency of a vast fed
Grafton Spanish speaking Republics. or,
quite as feasibly, he might have met with
Walkers and Lopaz's fate-the qGrOte Ell.
The ex-Emperor might have read at Chisle-
hurst, IN the columns Of a morning paper,
that according to the latest intelligence
from the Isthmus of Panama new hopes are
entertained of making a ship canal across
that obstruction. After failing to discover
a promising line for excavation in the mar
rover portion Of the neck U. S. surveyors,
under the direction Of Admiral Ammen,
have gone back to Nicaragua and now re-
port feasible place towards the north Of
the Isthmus." Why did not this para
graph, if he read it, recall the grand
scheme Of the ''Canal Napoleon de Nicara-
qua" to the exile's mind? Why did he not
think Of it in connection with his young
son, even then studying engineering at
Woolwich? Had he done so the poor
Prince Imperial and his friend, Ferdinand
de Lesseps, might have jOurneyed together
to the Isthmus, the Prince might have been
at this moment safe and sound, devoting
his talents and his energies to the conduct
OF All undertaking which, thirty years be-
fore, his father had not deemed beneath his
princely rank. 1t might have been, but it
was not to be. Fate forbade it, and !
'there is no armor against fate.
Paris, July 9Th, 1879.