Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1900-01-06

see in the fact the putting off of the dread
labor question 10 better era when France
shall be entering into tie fruits of this very
enterprise e.l,t, Not a ce1#ime of the money
Some of the estimates as to cost are pro-
digious. Between one and two milliards
and haif-2. 5OOO 600 900 francs-the accounts
fuctuate IF the Baltic canal which is
it Al German government engineers. 1O. 600
laborers and 22O,0O0 horse power during
five ti, years" says -. Vsfstraet: an director,
must be five times as long, will require five
times as many er.s1neets, say 2O5. five times
lo.Uo iaoorers. nye times 10000 horse
Then up speaks the partisan Suppose
you were going TO build street of 100
houses. The first house would need one
architect and two years of work. But
and 100 times TIVE years of work; that is
to say. 200 years to build the street?'
The Proposed Route.
The route of the canal is straight from
Arcachon to Agen on the Garonne eighty
six miles of easy cutting, without a single
lock. 1t will probably enter the Garonne
many miles above Agen. The waters of the
Garonne are themselves to be reinforced
from the streams Of the Pyrenees, which. it
Is thought, WIN save Toulouse and many
another town from the periodical inunda-
tons that now trouble them. The Garonne
strongly banked up and become the safe
drain of these mountain torrents. will then
take the fleets of war and commerce to
Toulouse. the central arsenal of France
Then. from every point French railways
will bring troops, provisions and munitions
Around Toulouse will be grouped cannon
and ammunition factories
From Toulouse to Castelnaudray the
route of the great canal is along the old
Canal de Languedoc, of Clara Wards an
cestor by marriage. The old canal abounds
Foot IN,
stretch. there are, Seventeen of them The
descent of the Aude-3OO feet-requlres more
than fifty. 1t is in its cuttings and locks
that the projected canal is to be most ex-
traordinary. Sixteen locks are planned to
do the whole job of the water shed that has
Its apex in the dreaded Col de Naurouze,
and they are to be the answer fsiFrench
engineering science to the hmentable fail
ure of Panama. < s.l ..
At the beginning it was seen that ordinary
locks would not serve; with them the pas
sage would require at least six days. One
way of diminishing their number-it Is est-
mated that 200 would be necessary-would
be the Old-fashioned plan of keeping the
canal to the low attitudes of the plains and
pass through it in giant cut 1t would be
a cut 800 feet deep. To avoid the neces-
sity of this almost impossible engineering
feat they have imagined prodigious now
city, the ship elevator and the moving lock.
Wonderful COntrivances.
The ship elevator is great metallic res
ervoir that moves up and down hill on a
great number of railway tracks, operated
much after the manner Of funicular.
There will be one at the top of the slope,
another at the bottom. Each will receive
ship. The weight Of the highest will be
balanced by the addition Of more water.
Then the equilibrium being attained
cient to disturb It.. Ep will go one reser-
voir and down the other. Nothing could be
simpler. ~; -
Where ordinary locks are to be used the
same principle of metallic basins balancing
each other. side by side. Is to be exploited,
for the sake Of expedition. They are to be
such locks as the world has never seen.
Once through thepr and into the Aude
river, it will be- plain towing straight to
Narbonne, which is almost on the Mediter-
ranean. Here y another naturally pro-
tected port. HkeIArcachon a great basin,
impenetrable by a hostile fleet.
This ends the Jsfe-pf the canal of the
Two seas, and the vivid 1magtna ton of the
Gaul again takes hold Imagine 1t con-
imagine the Mediterrd mean tunnel in full
working order. In THAT day France will
have become the mistress of the Medter-
ranean. She will give passage to her Rus
sian allys fleets at pleasure. Spain, enter
ing the French republic on an advanta-
geous basis her commercial and industrial
renaissance is accomplished. Politically
ance Germany. Algiers too, will have become
French soil. while from the far-of Soudan
come interminable trains loaded down
with precious raw material. All Africa will
come to know France the great near
country. From her corner isolated Italy
cannot but be sorely tempted to join the
republic. following Spain. The old dream
Of the confederated Latin states will be
accomplished by Industrial and commercial
motives. The confederation absorbs north
ern Africa. Including Egypt. 1t controls the
route to India and China.
ONLY one thought troubles the imagina-
tive savants who thus look into the future.
They hope Germany and England will not
have invented flying machines by the time
the Mediterranean tunnel and the canal of
the two seas are constructed.
STERLING HELLO.