On this page
- Departments (1)
-
Text (6)
-
IBmm^^^M^^- -THE O^BEBi, Q|5
-
' /UN iti*** /(PVt-tttti**! WjSXU QkUUUllU r
-
riNTHISj DBFABIUIKT, AS ALL OPINIONS, BO...
-
There is no learned man but "will confes...
-
THE SUEZ CANAIi. (To the Editor of the L...
-
Extraordinary Railway AccroBOT.—r-Three ...
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.
-
-
Transcript
-
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.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
History's Telescope. P. Rp You Ever Try ...
the , evasive locks bare been seduced over parts of tjie P » n « JB S head which time has bared . The most : fiiiniliar expression may not only be preserved by affection , but actually imprints itself indelibly visible to the eye . " " What were you thinking of ? " asks the lov-er , looking into the miniature given to him by his best "beloved ,- and tracing one of the numberless exp ressions which are so familiar though so changeful—" What were you thinking , of ? " " Of you" . And there is the thought self-printed for his keeping .
Ibmm^^^M^^- -The O^Bebi, Q|5
IBmm ^^^ M ^^ - -THE O ^ BEBi , Q | 5
' /Un Iti*** /(Pvt-Tttti**! Wjsxu Qkuuullu R
( $ ) $ tn € nnntil
Rinthisj Dbfabiuikt, As All Opinions, Bo...
riNTHISj DBFABIUIKT , AS ALL OPINIONS , BOWETBE , IXTEIMB , ABB AXLOWEB AIT EXPRESSION , THE BDITOB NECES 3 AKILT HOLDS HIMSELF 11 ESPON 8 IBI . K BOB . KONE . 2
There Is No Learned Man But "Will Confes...
There is no learned man but "will confess he hath , much profited by reading controversies , his senses awakened , and his judgment sharpened . If , then , it be profitable for him to read , -why should it not , at least , be tolerable for his adversary to "write . —Mixxoir .
The Suez Canaii. (To The Editor Of The L...
THE SUEZ CANAIi . ( To the Editor of the Leader . ) Sib , —It seemed probable that we should hear no more of the famous Suez Canal . The only reasonable ground f or 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 hi 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 of 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 b ^ drawn . An East Indiaman generally performs heiSwbyage 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 fort * night 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 beans were in this predicament for-a long time , and that the . English Government—not always alert to assist commercial operations—gave orders to its warsteamers on neighbouring stations to become tugs for the occasion . As there is no probability that the cutting of the isthmus will change the weather in the Mediterranean , it seems evident , at least Until screws can be adapted to all vessels engaged in this trade , that England , at any rato , has nothing to gain in point of time by the opening of this now route . la any case it will remain doubtful until
experience haB settled the question whether the kind Of , ( ships alone adapted for carrying on exportation f ^ om , India under proper condition of cheapness could safely navigate the Mediterranean . I must add that of course the causes of delay I have mentioned ao not all influence ports within the Straits ; but even their vessels make wonderfully tedious voyages . However , if tho chief difficulties lay on this side of the Isthmus of Suoz , Marseilles and Triesto would R » u \ In importance by the creation of tho canal , and w » 0 countries to which they form tho inlets might derive some advantage . The scheme would then bo reduced comparatively to one of local importance .
But on the other side of the isthmus there exist impediments to navigation called the Monsoons , of which the prompters of the canal seem never to have heard . During many months of the year it is ab-Bolutely 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 reach 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 o 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 ground 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 hi 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 sufficient 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 o 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 o 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 do Lesseps , 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 were proved to be a useful one . Lord Redcliffo approved of this view ; and certainly now is not the time for weakening and
opposing tho central authority in the Ottoman Empire . M . de Lesseps should have applied at Co nstantinople , not at Alexandria or Mehemetopolis ( the new city near tho Barrage ) , for a firman ; and if he could have obtained it , and Franco had really desired tho canal , wo should , as wo have said , have entertained only one objection . The navigators to be employed in this vast undertaking would , as in the . case of tho Mahmoudiyeh canal , have heonjclldhs forcibly taken from their villages , compelled to abandon tho labour by which they livo , only nominally paid , and placed under the care of a commissariat oven worse than one composod of English gentlemen . They would bo drivon out , hal f clad , in- troops into thq arid desert , and compelled to claw up tho earth and sand with
their fingers . When the Mahmoudiyeh was dug , even witjhin reach of water and exhaustless storehouses , some thirty thousand human beings perished from the-oeglect and brutality common in Egyptian administration . Their bones . are often exposed to view b y the crumbling of the ill-made bank hi 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 promis ed nothing to induce U 8 to wish such a price to be paid . Yours , & e * , Cavio .
Extraordinary Railway Accrobot.—R-Three ...
Extraordinary Railway AccroBOT . —r-Three persona met their death , on Tuesday , on . the Manchester and Sheffield Railway , after a very singular manner . John Healey , Thomas Priestnall , and Jane Hadfleld , 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 bis 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 j Priestnall lingered forty minutes . The train had been stopped on the viaduct while a Liverpool train was shunted on the Glossop branch . An inquest has been opened , hut 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 is now dead , but because England knows the loss she has sustained in the extinction of her most glorious luminary . —Nodes Ambroaiance .
Falmouth . —It was Raleigh who first called attention to Falmouth ' s magnificent harbour , and gave the impulse which brought it into importance . When he put in here , returning from hia 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-Quick . 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 ncwspap «» . 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 once 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 her prominenco in tho postal service . — A Londoner ' s Walk to the Land ' s End .
Tun Russian Army . — Russia has taxed her military resources almost to tho utmost ; and , after two yoars' campaigning , during which time she has lost no decisive battle , she cannot muster more than 600 , 000 to 650 , 000 regular troops , with 100 , 000 militia * and perhaps 50 , 000 irregular cavalry . Wo do not mean to any that sho is exhausted ; but , there is no doubt , that now , after two yoara' , sho could not do what Franco < Ha after twenty yoara war , and after tho total low of nor finest army in 1812 : pour forth a froah body ? > ° W men and arrest , a time at least , tho onslaught of tho onomy . So enormous is tho dORnonco , «« "" JJ JJJJ strength , between a densely and a thinly Pojmlatcd country . If Franco bordered on Biiwia , f ^^ tho inhabitants of ftu ** i *»«* » ^ . KJ * J ^ Una 88 , 000 , 000 French J ™^ f $$$%$££ « Z ZZ £ ? C ^ Z ! ° !^ ^ rffaht * doubt .-JPutman ' a Monthly .
-
-
Citation
-
Leader (1850-1860), Sept. 22, 1855, page 15, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_22091855/page/15/
-