The Ketchum keystone. [volume] (Ketchum, Idaho) 1885-1899, 1897-02-20
The Nicaragua Canal.

duu lllt0TcSt VI Tue OOnOS OF prl-
vate company to the amount OF
100000, 900, there are one or two
cardinal facts, says the Scientific
American, which need to be kept
prominently in the public eye, par
ticularly as there seems to be a dis
position on the part of the promo
ters of the bill to keep these facts
conveniently out of the discussion.
We have always been favorable
to the Nicaraguan Canal as such,
and there is no public journal that
would be more gratified than our
own if it could be proved that
the canal can be built for a sum
of money upon which the prospec-
tive traffic would pay a reasonable
rate Of interest. But, as the matter
now stands, this is a vital question
upon which everybody is in the
dark, and nobody more so than the
engineers themselves.
1t is now about four years ago
that a previous effort was made to
secure a government guarantee Of
the bonds. Some doubts were ex-
pressed at the time as to the esti-
mated cost of construction; and
the absence of any accurate infor-
nation .on this head led to the
rejection of the bill and the ap-
pointment of a board of experts
to make an independent examina-
ton for the government. Three
engineers of high standing, respec-
lively in the army, the navy, and in
civil practice, made an examination
on the ground of the proposed route
of the canal. They made as COM
plete an investigation as the funds
at their disposal would permit, and
their report stated that the esti-
mates of the canal company's engi
neers would have to be raised from
$69, 1893, $50 to 1913 ,472 1893, or prac-
tically doubled.
1t was evident that the government
experts considered the estimates of
the canal company's engineers to
have been based upon too rapid
and superficial survey of the route
and that the data was too incom-
plete to give them any reliable
value. As an instance of the dis
crepany between the figures Of the
two estimates, it may be mentioned
that the maximum flood discharge
Of the river near the Ochoa dam was
estimated at $4,000 cubic feet per
second by the company's engineers
and at 10000 cubic feet BY the gov
eminent experts. The great Ochoa
dam, in some respects an unprece.
denied undertaking, was estimated
by the company to cost 1917 900
and by the board of engineers to
cost 81 100000! These are only two
instances cut Of a lengthy report
which proved that, as the affairs of
he canal then stood, any legislation
oy the government would have been
simply leap in the dark. The re-
port concluded with recommended
lion that $35O,OOO be appropriated
for an exhaustive examination,
which should extend over eighteen
months, or long enough to enable
/ reliable estimate of the rainfall |
% be obtained.
Now it is obvious that the next
natural thing to do would have
oeen to have the sum voted and
be expert commission sent out.
The high character of the engineers
vas a guarantee of the sincerity of
he report, and it stood there, as it
stands to-day, an insuperable bar
Ter to any fiotation Of bonds for
Of the work. If the |
inns of the canal company were to
build great engineering work that
should be a benefit to commerce
md a profitable investment for cap
tai, they should at once have
pressed for the execution of such g
survey as.the expert board recon-
nended. There was nothing to
ose and everything to gain by a
BONA fide investigation of what the
canal company presented as bona
ide scheme. Provision for the sur
yey could readily have been secured,
md by this time reliable data would |
nave been available.
Instead of following this very
obvious course, the canal company
las done everything in its power to
brow discredis upon the report of
he professional men who were sent
,ut TO safeguard the interests of the
,ation, and the promoters of the
dill have ignored the report alto
yether. They are now seeking to
push through the bill in its original
orm, with its enormous guarantee
If $1OO,OO0.OOO of bonds for the
of a work which no.
,ody knows much about.
Why this haste2 If the canal
cheme is a good one it will bear
Investigation, and if the nation is
o be virtually committed to its
construction, it surely has RICH,
o know the cost. This it does no,
'now, and: as the experts have
hown, has no means of knowing