CHAPTER III. THE GREAT WATERWAY. NICARAGUA has long claimed the attention of maritime nations on account of the facilities it offers for the building of a ship canal to connect the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. The want of such a communication was felt much further back in the history of civilization than is generally suspected. In truth it was the impelling force that, four hundred years ago, started Columbus out to search for a western passage to the Indies, and so led to the discovery of the new world. Long before the American coast was thoroughly explored, the San Juan River was fixed on as offering a possible way of connecting the two oceans. This suggestion was made by the Portuguese, Antonio Galvao, as far back as 1550. In the interim other routes have been advocated, but careful surveys made by the United States government demonstrated almost a decade before the disastrous attempt at Panama, that the Nicaragua route was the only practicable one. The subject was first officially considered by the United States government in 1825, when Señor Cañaz, the minister to Washington from the Central American Confederation, addressed a note to Mr. Clay, then Secretary of State, inviting his attention to the advantages of the San Juan River and Lake Nicaragua for the construction of a canal. Except, however, that Mr. Clay instructed Mr. Williams, the United States chargé d'affaires in Central America to ascertain if surveys had been made and if confidence could be placed in their accuracy, no action was taken by the government. Private enterprise was also about the same time first directed to the matter, and in June, 1826, A. H. Palmer, of New York, who had associated with him De Witt Clinton and other prominent men of the United States, secured a contract from the government of Central America to build a canal through Nicaragua "for vessels of the largest burden possible." Although they proposed to do the work with only $5,000,000, they failed to raised the money, and so the enterprise was abandoned. The next agitation of the subject was made by the King of the Netherlands, who organized an association of capitalists, and in March, 1829, sent an, envoy, General Ver Veer, to Central America to secure the requisite concession. The Central American Congress voted in the following year to grant the concession, but the disruption of his kingdom forced the king to relinquish the project. The question was revived from time to time in various ways. In 1835 the United States. government ordered Colonel Charles H. Biddle to inspect the several proposed canal routes, beginning with that of Nicaragua. Colonel Biddle went to Central America, but did not make the inspection. Two years later the Central American government employed Lieutenant John Bailey, a retired British naval officer, who had for some time been a resident of Nicaragua, to make surveys for the proposed canal. Lieutenant Bailey's appear to have been the first actual surveys, but they were confined chiefly to the country between the lake |