M. de Lesseps, in cutting a canal between the Mediterranean and Red

Seas, was no nev/ idea, but rather the completion of a scheme that had been in existence in the days of Rameses the Great. Still I do not wish to detract, in any way, from the great work as completed by this celebrated engineer in the year 1869. I simply wish to state that what he, and the workmen under him, accomplished in connect- ing the two seas was an old idea, and that the thought of constructing such a waterway or canal did not originate in the nineteenth century. It had already been accomplished in the hoary ages of the past, in the Golden Age of Egyptian splendor.
The principal and most important idea in the construction of the Suez Canal was, first to find the place where the waters of the Medi- terranean were the deepest and nearest to the coast of Egypt. After this was done, to establish a starting point from that place and make it a point of operation. Then to build a town, as close to this point as possible, and establish there immense workshops and dwellings for
l-^ EGYPT, THE CRADLE OF ANCIENT MASONRY.
ihf iiK'u c'iiu;;ij;cd in the work of culliiii;' a canal from sea to sea, tliroiioli wliieli ships nii};ht be enal)le(l lo pass witli little nr no diffi- culty or danger.
There is no qnestion (hal 1\1. de Lesseps carefully matured his ])lans as to the mode of procedure in constructing this maritime canal. It was a great responsibility to undertake such an immense piece of work, bnl M, de Lesseps was just the man needed. When IMahomnu'd vSaid I'aslia became Viceroy of Egypt, in 1854, he used his ntniost endeavors to carr_\' on the work so ably j)lanned 1)\' his fatlu'r, Mohammed Ali. He sent lor M. tie Lesseps in order to con- sult him niKin llie possibility of constructing a canal across the isthmus, and the best way to proceed about it. The result of this interview was that a commission was signed and given to AI. de Lesseps, authorixing him to organize a company. The said company was to be known as " The Universal Suez Caiud Company," for the express ])nrpose of raising funds and pushing the preliminary work as rapidl}^ as jiossible ; bnt there were uuiny things which deferred the commcnceUKnt of the work.
In 1X3(1 an International Commission had been organized, with representatives from England, France, Prussia, Austria, the Netherlands, and Spain. This Commission nuxlified the previous arrangements made, by altering the luie originall}' chosen to one a little farther north, so as to reach a place where the deep waters of the Mediterranean came closer to land. Locks were done awa\- with, and the breakwaters, or jetties at each enil of the canal, were slightly i hanged. A iVcsh water canal fnnn l>nlak, to convey water for the Tise of the workmen was agreed upon, and other minor tlclails settled. The details dragged along slowly, and M. tie Lesseps was anxit)us to commence operations; bnt various obstacles held him back and compelled him lo " wait and hope." On the 25th da}' of April, in the year 1S59, a small ditch was cut in the sandy spit that separates the waters of the Mediterranean from Lake> Menzala. This work was performed in the presence of ]\L de Lesseps and four directors of the Company, and may be claimed as the first formal com- mencement of the great work. The surveying and selection o( the site, as well as marking the place lor the work lo begin, as planned and laid (Uit by M. lie Lessep, was performed by I\L Laroche.
EGYPT, THE CRADLE OF ANCIENT MASONRY. 125
Let me here quote from Murray, rather lliaii depend wyxm my notes (page 2S7) : "From the moulli of tlie Damietta branch of tlic Nile to the Gulf of Pelusinm there stretches a low belt of sand, varying in width from two hundred to three hundred yards, serving to sejiarate the Mediterranean from the waters of Lake Menzala ; though often, when the lake is full and the waves of the Mediterranean are high, the two meet across tlie slight liouudary line. In the beginniug of the montli of Ajjril, 1859, a small body of men, who miglit well be called the pioneers of the vSuez Canal, headed by M. Laroclie, landed at that s])()t of the narrow sandy sli]), whicli had been cliosen as the starting point of the canal from the Mediterranean, and the site of the city and port intended ultimately to rival Alexandria. It owed its selection, not to its being the spot from which the shortest line could be drawn — that would have been the Gulf of Pelusinm — but to its being that jjoint of the coast to which dee]) water appproached the nearest. There eight metres of water, equal to about twenty-six feet, the contemplated depth of the canal, were found at a di.stance of less than two miles. At the Gulf of Pelusinm that dejilli only existed at more llian five miles from the coast. The spot was called Port vSaid, in honor of the then Viceroy. On the 25th of April, M. de Lesseps, surrounded by ten or fifteen Europeans and some one hundred native workmen, gave the first stnjke of the spade to the future Bosphorus between Asia and Africa. Hard, indeed, must have been the life of the first workers on this desolate strip of sand. The nearest place fioni which fresh water could be procured was Damietta, a distance of thirty-six miles. It was brought thence across Lake Menzala in Arab Ijoats, but calms or storms often delayed the arrival of the looked f tr store ; sometimes, indeed, it was altogether lost and the powers of endurance of the little band were sorely tried. After a time di-stilling machines were put uj), and, in 1863, water was received through pipes from the Fresh "Water Canal which liad been completed to the centre of the Istlimus."
The town of Port vSaid unquestionably owes its origin to the construction of the vSuez Canal. It is located at the entrance end of a small island, behmging U) that narrow strip of sandy beach which separates Lake Menzala from the Mediterranean Sea. It has been laid out with fine broad streets and handsome brick buildings. There is
126 EGYPT, THE CRADLE OF ANCIENT MASONRY,
nothing to interest the tourist or student in the town itself, excepting its remarkable growth from an insignificant sand spit, to a city of over forty thousand inhabitants, and the largest coaling station in the world. But the immense amount of laborious dredging necessary before laying the foundation is simply inexpressible. The town soon became a regular manufacturing and repairing workshop, as it were, with machinery running day and night. Mechanics of all kinds were con- tinually employed, some in laying the foundation of the rising city, others making the enormous stones for the jetties, carpenters and builders putting up houses, while hundreds of men were engaged in the con- struction of the harbors and basins. All was bustle and work, resulting in a citj^ of about forty thousand in less than forty years, with beautiful hotels, mosques, hospitals, churches, dwelling houses ; in fact, all the adjuncts of a modern sea poit. In the construction of this canal they used some of the most extraordinary dredges ever known. In order that you, my dear brothers and readers, may be enabled to understand some- thing about them and their value in the construction, I will quote you from Murray, page 284 : " First among them was the long couloir (long duct), an iron spout of semi-elliptical form, two hundred and thirty feet long, iive and one-half wide, and two deep ; by means of which a dredger, working in the centre of the channel, could discharge its contents beyond the bank. This enormous spout was supported on an iron framework, which rested partly on the dredge and partly on a floating lighter. The dredgings, when dropped into the upper end of this spout, were assisted in their progress down it, by water supplied by a rotary pump, and by an endless chain, to which were fixed scrapers — large pieces of wood that fitted the inside of the spout and forced on pieces of stone and clay. By these means the spouts could deliver their dredgings at almost a hori- zontal line, and the water had the further good effect of reducing the dredgings to a semi-liquid condition, thus causing them to spread them- selves over a larger surface, and settle down better. The work done by these long spouted dredges was extraordinary ; eighty thousand cubic yards of soil a month was the average, but as much as one hundred and twenty thousand was sometimes accomplished. When the banks were too high for the long spouts to be tised, another ingenious machine called an elevateiir, was introduced. This consisted of an inclined plane, run-
EGYPT, THE CRADLE OF ANCIENT MASONRY. 127
ning upwards from over the water line, and supported on an iron frame, the lower part of which rested over the water, on a steam float, and the upper part on a platform, moving on rails along the bank. The plane carried a tramway, along which ran an axle on wheels, worked by the engine of the steam float. From this axle hung four chains. As soon as a lighter containing seven huge boxes filled with dredgings was towed under the lower part of this e/evatetcr, the chains hanging from the axle were hooked to one of the boxes, and the machine being set in motion the box was first raised, and then carried along swinging beneath the axle to the top of the plane ; then by a self-acting contrivance, it tilted over and emptied its contents over the bank. It was then run down again, dropped into its place in the lighter, and the operation repeated with the next box. No such dredging operations had ever been undertaken before."
The harbor of Port Said has an area of about five hundred and seventy acres, with an average depth of twenty-seven f'^et, the entrance to which is protected by two very strong and substantial stone piers. The one on the East running out into the sea in a northerly direction for fully a mile, while the one on the V/est extends into the sea in a north-easterl}^ direction for about one mile and a half Where these piers start from the land, they are seven hundred and twenty fathoms apart, but they approach each other, at their extremities, to about three hundred and eighty-five fathoms There is a channel or entrance ranging from fifty to eight}^ fathoms wide, that is well marked and buoyed. These buo3^s are lit up at night so as to direct the pilot in the course he should take in his passage with vessels going into or out of the harbor. _ The lighthouse stands on the low sandy spit, that I have already referred to, which separates the INIediterranean from Lake Menzala. It is built of concrete fully one hundred and seventy-six feet high. It is furnished with electric lights that are distinctl}' visible at a distance of twenty-four miles at sea. It is a flash light that flashes every twenty seconds.
I do not wish to dwell upon the town of Port Said, or to give a full account of the moles and harbor, or the towns that sprang into existence through the construction of this remarkable canal, one of the grandest, if not the greatest piece of w-ork ever performed during the wonderful
128 EGYPT, THE CRADLE OF ANCIENT MASONRY.
nineteenth century — connecting the Red with the Mediterranean Sea at the enormous outlay of about eight hundred and fifty million dollars, up to the opening of the canal, on the seventeenth day of November, 1869. The canal was not entirely completed at that date, as it only had about nineteen to twenty feet of water in it, allowing only light draft ships to pass through, those drawing not over eighteen feet of water. At the present writing, however, there is an average depth of twenty- seven feet nine inches, from Port Said to the Red Sea, thus enabling vessels of large draft to pass safely through its entire length of one hundred miles, without difficult}^ or danger. The average width of this canal is two hundred and fifty-nine feet. But in some of the deep cut- tings the width is only about one hundred and ninety feet wide on the water line, while in other places, where the banks are low, the water line is full}^ three hundred and twenty-eight feet, thus making the average width of the canal two hundred and fifty-nine feet.
The passage through the canal saves, on the voyage from England to Bombay, nearly five thousand miles, and from New York to the same place, there is a saving of about three thousand six hundred miles in distance, and possibly three weeks in time. As I previously stated, the scheme of connecting the two seas was no new idea, originating in the nineteenth century. It had been under contemplation long centuries before Christ ; for it is recorded by Aristotle, Strabo and many other historians that Rameses II. cut a canal between the sea and the river Nile, B. c. 1340.
Wilkinson in his "Ancient Egyptians," Volume I, page 74, ef scg., quoting Herodotus, says, " Sesostris (Rameses) fitted out a fleet of war ships that went bej^ond the Red Sea, invading India." He supposes that Rameses II. was the first of the Egyptian monarchs who built ships of war, although he admits that they may have been used at a much earlier period. He also says, "And we may reasonabl}^ conclude the fleet to have been connected with the Indian trade, as well^ as the canal he cut from the Nile, to what is now called the Gulf of Suez. This canal commenced about twelve miles to the north-east of the modern town of Belbys, called b3^ the Romans Biibasth Agria, although Strabo claims that it started from the village of Thecansa, not far from Pithom. After flowing in a direction nearly East for about thirty-three miles, it
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turned to Soutli-soutlieast, and continued about sixty-three more in that line to the extremity of the Arabian Gulf."
Again he says although the old channel is " filled with sand its direction is still easily traced, as well from the appearance of its channel as from the mounds and vestiges of ancient towns upon its banks, in one of which I found a monument bearing the sculpture and name of Rameses