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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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tfie > evasrve tecfes have been seduced over parts of the JJBnreii ' s head which time has &&re < J . The most ifamiliar expression may not only be preserved by affection , but actually imprints itself indelibly visible to the eye . " What were you thinking of ? " asks the lover , looking into the miniature given to him by his best beloved , and tracing one of the numberless expressions which are so familiar though so changeful— " What were you thinking of F ? " Of your And there is the thought self-printed for his keeping .
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CUT THIS DBPARTMESX , AS ALL OPIIHONS , HOWBTEB EIIEKME , ABB AU . OWKD AN EXPRESSION , THE EDITOE NECESSABILX HOLDS HIMSELF KESPONSIBLE FOB HONE . 3
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THE SUEZ CANAL . ( To the Editor of the Leader . ' ) Sir , —It seemed probable that vre should hear no more of the famous Suez Canal . The only reasonable ground for its construction would have been its utility to commerce . A short and cheap road for merchant vessels to the East Indies would certainly have been a great boon . It seems the peculiar task , moreover , of this age to annihilate distance . But in trade cheapness is equivalent to " shortness . Except in the case of perishable articles , no loss is incurred if a voyage lasts five instead of two months , provided freight remains precisely the same ; or , rather , to be more particular , provided all expenses , including interest of money , be equally balanced .
Now it happens that if a canal existed across the Isthmus of Suez , the road thus created would be neither shorter nor cheaper . A short road is that which keeps the voyager little time on his journey ; and it is sometimes more expeditious to go round a hill than over its top . Those who invented this scheme merely looked at the map of our hemisphere , and measured distance by the compass . They forgot all they must have learned at school about the trade winds , the influences of current , &c , and would not even notice the great ocean routes which are generally marked on maps in bright lines to attract attention . On the great waters it happens to be a rule that a straight line is never the shortest . Every long voyage is a curve . It is rare that even the most powerful steamers when leaving port put their head on to the point of destination .
A few facts were laid before the promoters of the canal , the significance o which they could not or would not understand . First , with especial reference to English interests , for many partisans were created in our own country , whence , indeed , the greatest part of the capital necessary was to be drawn . An East Indiaman generally- performs her voyage home from Calcutta to Liverpool in less than four months , sometimes in less than three . A vessel fitted for the navigation of the Mediterranean takes from seventy to ninety days to come from Alexandria to the same destination ; and nothing is more common than for whole fleets of merchantmen to be detained a fortnight or three weeks by adverse winds within the Gut of Gibraltar . I remember that in 1847 more than a hundred vessels laden with corn and beana
were in this predicament for a long time , and that tjbe , English Government—not always alert to assist commercial operations—gave orders to its warsteamers on neighbouring stations to become tugs f 6 r the occasion . As there is no probability that the cutting 1 of the isthmus will change the weather in the Mediterranean , it seems evident , at least until screws can be adapted to all vessels ongaged in tjhis trade , that England , at any rate , has nothing to gain in point of time by the opening of this now route . In any case it will remain doubtful until experience has settled the question whether the kind
But on the other * side of the isthmus there exist impediments to navigation called the Monsoons , of which the promoters of the canal seem never to have heard . During many months of the year it is absolutely impossible for any sailing vessel to come up the Red Sea ; the coalers of the ^ Peninsular and Oriental Company have often been detained ninety or a hundred days on the way , even when the worst of the season has passed . In fine weather , the average length of a sailing voyage even from Bombay to Suez is at least seventy days . Under present circumstances , accordingly , it takes nearly as long to traverse the distance between any Indian port and Marseilles via Suez as via the Cape ; and much longer to xeach any ocean port by the same route . Of course by improvements in navigation and the application of steam these difficulties may , to a certain extent , be overcome ; but the Cape route is also becoming shorter and shorter every day , and we question whether screw-ships of equal burden will not always perform the voyage by the ocean more cheaply , more rapidly , and more safely than by the narrow seas . However , if France sees that any commercial advantage can be derived to herself- —for , after all , this is an eminently French question ^—by the opening of the Isthmus of Suez , there is no reasonable grounc for interfering with her , except one , which I shall presently point out- But she must provide the capital herself . Austria , whom the promoters of the scheme formerly endeavoured to draw in , no longer believes either in its utility or feasibility . In 1847 it sent out a commission to survey the Isthmus of Suez , and by the report of that commission was convinced that the canal , instead of costing two hundred thousand pounds sterling ,, as its enthusiastic advocates believed , or pretended to believe , would cost at least five millions . Some of its members were even persuaded that the work was physically impossible . On surveying the Bay of Tineh they found that in most parts the water was so shallow that they were obliged to anchor out of sight of the land . At one point , however , they could approach within four miles . They saw that it would be necessary to cut and keep open a channel through a vast bank of mud , the surplus mud of the Nile carried out to sea and washed round in that direction by the currents . The idea of the wild promoters was that the water of the Red Sea running rapidly through the canal would be suflScient to keep the Mediterranean mouth open ; but close at hand were the two embouchures of the Nile completely stopped up by a bar under the very conditions which they esteemed so favourable . The Austrian engineers , however—and I believe their opinion has since been confirmed—declared that the enormous difference of level between the Red Sea and the Mediterranean did not exist—that the idea was the result of a gross blunder . At the same time the majority of them , I think , admitted that , considering the progress made by the science of engineering , it was not absolutely impossible to cut and keep open the canal . The question was merely one of time and money . They left it to their Government to say whether the results promised would justify the prodigious efforts necessary ; and their Government , agreeing with all English statemen , and Lord Redcliffe in particular , most positively declined to give any pecuniary assistance . Their decision , much influenced by the elaborate controversy carried on in the press , which , on the other hand , was purposely supplied with materials of discussion by them , proved fatal to the idea of a grand confederation of European nations for the purpose of bringing the far East and the far West together by means of a channel cut across an uninhabitable desert . I do not know what were the terms of the firman granted by Said Pacha to M . Ferdinand de Lessepa , but I have no doubt that if Lord Redcliffe really did oppose its confirmation , it was on two very reasonable grounds : one having reference to Turkish imperial policy , the other being merely one of humanity . The Porte has always maintained that , although Suez and Tineh are within the viceroyalty of Egypt , the question of a canal across the isthmus is eminently a Turkish , not an Egyptian , question . From the very outset it resolved that the initiative should not come from any Pacha , but from itself , in case the work wore proved to bo a useful one . Lord Redeliflb approved of this view ; and certainly now is not the time for weakening und opposing the central authority in the Ottoman Empire . M . do Lesseps should have applied at Constantinople , not at Alexandria or Mehemetopolis ( the new city near the Barrage ) , for a firman ; and if he could have obtained it , and France had really desired the canal , wo should , as wo havo said , have entertained only one objection . The navigators to bo employed in this vast undertaking would , as in the case of the Mahmoudiyeh canal , have boon fcllAhs forcibly taken from their villages , compelled to abandon the labour by which they live , only nominally paid , nnd placed under the caro of a commissariat even worse than one composod of English gentlemen . They would bo driven out , half clad , in troops into the arid desert , and compelled to claw up the earth and sand with I
of ships alone adapted for carrying on exportation from India under proper condition of cheapness could Bafely navigate the Mediterranean . I must add that of course the causes of delay I havo mentioned do not , all influence ports within the Straits ; but even their vessels make wonderfully tedious voyages . However , if the chief difficulties lay on this side of the Isthmus of Suez , Marseilles and . Trieste would gttlti in importance by the creation of the canal , and tne countries to which they form the inlets might derive some advantage . The scheme would then be reduced comparatively to one of local importance .
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their fingers . When the Mahmoudiyeh was dug even witfiiri ! reach of water and exhaustless storehouses , some thirty thousand human beings perished from the neglect and brutality common in Egyptian administration . Their bones are often-exposed to view by- the crumbling of the ill-made bank in which they- were buried . Can we wish to see similar scenes repeated . Can we wish ; to hear of thousands and tens of thousands of Egyptian serfs perishing of hunger and thirst in the Desert of Suez in order that M . Ferdinand de Lesseps may make a good thing of his firman ; and that Marseilles may receive in its stinking port a few dozen ships more per annum . We are promised nothing , to induce us to wish such a price to be paid . Yours , &c , Cavio .
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There is no learned man but will confess lie hath much profited by reading controversies , his senses awakened , and his judgment sharpened . If , then , it be profitable for ham to read , -why should it not , at lease , be tolerable for bis adversary to -write . —Mixioir .
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^^ E ^] j ^ 2 fe 18 S 5 Ll ,. .. THI LEAl ^ EK , 915
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Extraokdinaby Railway Accident . —Three persons met their death , on Tuesday , on the Manchester and Sheffield Railway , after a very singular manner . John Healey , Thomas Priestnall , and Jane Hadfield , young persons connected with cotton and weaving factories , had been with a party of Sunday . School teachers to spend the day at Bellevue Gardens , Manchester . On returning , the train stopped for a few minutes on the viaduct across Dinting Vale , near a station . Healey immediately got out of the carriage , thinking they had arrived at their journey ' s end , and held , out his hand for Jane Hadfield , who also got out , and stepped on the pararapet of the viaduct , which was a little below the floor of the carriages .
Conceiving they were on the platform , they literally stepped over the parapet , and disappeared . Another young woman then got out , but , having some suspicion , tried the width of the ground with one foot while she stood on the other . By this time , the accident had been discovered by the people in the carriage , who pulled her back . Immediately afterwards , however , Priestnall leaped out of the next carriage , and he too went over the viaduct . The occurrence took place at about twelve minutes to ten o ' clock at night . Healey and Hadfield were killed at once ; Priestnall lingered forty minutes . The tram had been stopped on the viaduct while a Liverpool train was shunted on the Glossop branch . An inquest has been opened , but is not yet concluded .
Byron . —The character of one of the greatest poets the world ever saw , in a very few years , will be discerned in the clear light of truth . How quickly all misrepresentations die away ! One hates calumny , because it is ugly and . odious in its own insignificant and impotent stinking self . But it is almost always extremely harmless . I believe , at this moment , that Byron is thought of , as a man , with an almost universal feeling of pity , forgiveness , admiration , and love . I do not think it would be safe in the most popular preacher to abuse Byron now—and that not merely because he ia nc \ y dead , but because England knows the loss she has sustained in the extinction of her most glorious luminary . ' —Nodes AmbrosiwnoB .
Falmouth . —It was Raleigh who first called attention to Falmouth ' s magnificent harbour , arid gave the impulse which brought it into importance . When he put in here , returning from his expedition , to Guiana in search of Eldorado , he found , as is recorded , but a single house , the nucleus of a village which afterwards went by the name of Penny-come-QuicTc . The site of some of the earliest houses is yet to be seen near the centre of the town , and a story is told to explain the curious name ; but it sounds like one of those which never were true . And out of this grew Falmouth , one day to
become the chief station of the government mail-packets . Some thirty years ago the arrival of a packet was an incident to be eagerly announced to the whole kingdom by the newspapers . First started in 1688 to ply to Spain and Portugal , the number was increased until a regular service was established with the colonies and some principal foreign ports . They sailed to Lisbon onco a week , to other places once a month , and brought us news from Brazil , Now York , the West Indies , and Madeira , whenever they could , at the pleasure of wind and weather . All are now superseded by steam-vessels % , and not till Falmouth is linked to London by a railway
and electric telegraph will she regain lior prominence m tho postal service . —A Londoner ' s Walk to the Land's End . Thb Russian Army . — Russia ^ 'hos taxed her military resources almost to tho utmost ; and , after two years' campaigning , during which time sho has lost no decisive battle , she cannot muster more than 600 , 000 to 050 , 000 regular troops , with 100 , 000 militia , and perhaps 60 , 000 irregular cavalry . Wo do not mean to say t hat
that eho is exhausted ; but , there ia no doubt , now , after two yeara' war , she could not do what Franco am after twenty years' war , and aftor tho total loss of- »<* finest army in 1812 : pour forth a frosh body f . ^ YZ men and arrest , for a time nt least , tho onfllaugh t < ft * 10 enemy . So enormous is tho W ™^^ £$ L strength , between a densoly and a tn"lv * qqqqoq counfry . If Franco bordered on " ^ ^ ffl s rrodrv ^ r ^/ n ^ rxit Lu . ~ Putman ' a Monthly .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Sept. 22, 1855, page 915, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2107/page/15/
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