The Montgomery advertiser., 1904-01-21

ana storage reservoir to Alheiueia. s Farce Enacted by De Lesseps.
 It would, however, nave been possible Tor the original French company to com piete the lock canal for the amount of money actually thrown Into the enterprise bad that plan been adopted at the begirA ming and the work prosecuted earnestly and honestly, This, thongh. Is exactly what was not done. Years were wasted and millions of dollars flung away and the French company was on the verge of bankruptcy when 1t finally decided upon that plan. It was then too late for 1t to achieve any definite results. France WAS agoE with the tales of corruption in con nection with the work; DeLesseps's credit was irretrievably shattered, and the end of the string had been reached. These facts did not feaze the French engineer. however, for just when crushing disaster was breeding he made triumphal trip to the isthmus. occupied his palatial res idence on Cristobal Colon Point for one week. unveiled the Columbus statue which the Empress Eugenie had presented to the company. and in grandloquent speech declared the canal open to navi- gation.
 At that moment the canal was open to Bohio-open as d narrow, shallow ditch The thing the French had begun in earn est ended right there, having progressed through monumental tragedy, profigate waste and limttiess criminaIity to the farce of DeLesseps standing at one end of ditch and declaring ship canal open to commerce. The great French engineer returned to his native country to be ai- most immediately carried down under the crash of the whole enterprise--to be tried and sentenced to penal sefvitude for his participancy in the gigantic crime which had been perpetrated. It is hardly neces- sary to say that the United States will never blunder as did that gang of French men; that when we begin work we will know exactly what we are to do, and that when the canal shall be declared open it will be open in fact. so that ships may pass directly through it, saving 110OO mues on a voyage from Colon to Panama -cities that lie only forty-seven miles apart.
 Actual Crimes Committed.
 But grave as was the error of Indefinite ness and indecision committed by the or igfnal French company, it pales before the enormity of the c,Hnes committed by those who were actually in charge of the work. Ons might write book on this subject alone; but few details will suf- flee to show the unhlushng rascality practiced here. From the moment those sent to the isthmus to superintend the construction of the canal arrived until
  the final crash came there was perfect saturnalia of graft, aided and abetted by the crowd who kept headquarters of the company open in Paris, and who were ready for their share, to pay raScality's demands. There was stealing outright; there was stealing by means of the pur- chase of superfuous machinery; there was stealing by means of the awarding of contracts at exorbitant prices; there was stealing by the extortion of commits sions on every contract awarded: there was stealing in the purchase of the most minor supplies-there was, in short steal ing at eevry turn and upon every hand, until it may be said that there was not a tool brought to the isthmus nor a yard of work done along the canal route that represented entire honesty.
 At the northern end of the waterway the evidence of stealing begins at Cristobal Colon Point To build a breakwater to pro- tect the entrance of the canal the French built 8 small paradise-1,000 feet out into Limon Bay and several hundred feet wide, Money was lavished there with appalling