PREFACE TO THE REVISED EDITION.

Since the first edition of this volume left the press, the writer has made two visits to the scene of the Canal operations.

The lengthy chapter which is now added, brings the account of the work down to the close of the year 1912, and includes a prospective view of its completion. This is rendered possible by the fact that all the essential features of the Canal are now fixed beyond possibility of change. Anything further that may be written about the operation can deal only with progress and the perfection of details.

It was expected from the first, and it may be predicated of the future, that such accidents as are inseparable from a task of this character will occur from time to time, until the locks are thrown open to the first vessel which may pass through the waterway. It is unlikely, however, that such natural incidents as the settling of fills and the sliding of cuts will again afford sufficient foundation for public agitation.

The construction of the Canal is assured. The date of its opening is approximately calculable. It will be a work as nearly perfect as the intelligence and resources of the present age can command.

FORBES LINDSAY.

December 1, 1912.

PREFACE.

In the following pages I have endeavored to relate the story of the Canal from the earliest explorations to the present time, with as much avoidance as possible of technics and in a manner that shall be comprehensible to the general reader. A certain degree of familiarity with the scene of the operation on the Isthmus and a somewhat close study of the subject may have enabled me to achieve my purpose.

At the time of going to press with the book the ultimate form of the Canal has not been decided upon, but, since it is reasonably certain that the multi-lock plan recommended by the minority of the Consulting Engineers will be adopted, that plan has been most extensively treated, and selected for map-illustration, although the sea-level project of the Board is also described.

For my information I am largely indebted to offcial sources, supplemented and corroborated by reliable observations of men who have recently been in the Canal Zone. All the available data at the command of the Commission has been at my disposal and I take this opportunity to acknowledge my appreciation of the prompt and courteous response with which my many enquiries and requests have been met.

C. H. F. L.

PHILADELPHIA, April, 1906.