of the canal. The franchise is valuable independently, but in connection with construction its ownership became necessary to the company. Considerable acquisitions of private lands between Lake Nicaragua and the Pacific have been made under the expropriation provisions mentioned.

The country through which the course of the canal is laid for the first 10 miles from the coast is a flat, alluvial formation, the accumulation of centuries, with occasional lagoons and swamps covered with zacate and silico palms or the primeval forests and a dense, tangled, almost impenetrable, mass of underbrush and vines. From thence its, course is through wooded and fertile valleys between low hills to the divide cut, and thence to a connection at Ochoa with the San Juan; above Ochoa, it receives the waters of the San Carlos. From the mouth of the San Carlos, the course of the San Juan—then and thereafter the route of the canal-is through what may be termed the highlands of the river, the abutting flanks of the Cordillera. Sixteen miles above the San Carlos occur the Machuca Rapids; 5 and 6 miles farther on, Balas; 6 miles beyond are Castillo Rapids, the most important of all; and 9 miles farther the Toro Rapids, beyond which, to the lake, the course of the river is through a broad valley of lowlands, bounded by remote hills. Above the San Carlos and at Machuca, the forests which clothe the banks of the river are tropical in luxuriance. The lofty trees are draped with vines which creep and twine among their branches and droop to the water's edge in massive walls of verdure.

Above Machuca there are occasional clearings-where the lands are cultivated or grazed-through which the distant hills appear. At other places the hills themselves rise with steep and almost precipitous slopes directly from the river. Squier likens this part of the river to the highlands of the Hudson. At Castillo is an old Spanish fort, garrisoned by the Nicaraguan Government. It was considered impregnable by its builders, but was captured by a British force in 1780. Post Captain (afterwards Admiral) Nelson was in command of the naval corps of the expedition.

The erection of a dam at Ochoa and the execution of other works of canalization will, of course, change many of the present aspects of the river, deepening its waters over the rapids, and in numerous places expanding them into broad and lake-like surfaces, adding to its advantages for navigation and to its beauties as part of an already delightful landscape. One important peculiarity of the San Juan, already adverted to, should be particularly noted. It is exempt from the floods common to other tropical streams. This is owing to the fact that the great lakes serve as receiving reservoirs, on the broad expanses of which the rainfall is stored and from which it is delivered slowly instead of being concentrated from the adjacent hillsides into narrow valleys, and thus massed into rushing torrential floods.

The commercial problem which the opening of a canal across Nicaragua would solve is the same to-day as that which stimulated Columbus and his contemporaries and successors to their arduous efforts. The only difference is in the increased magnitude of its advantages.

It is still the discovery of a direct east and west route for the commerce of the world. Four centuries ago, that commerce consisted of the interchange of commodities between Europe and Asia. Since that time, there has been added to the nations then existing and to their growth in population, production, and consumption, a new continent, peopled now by 100,000,000 inhabitants, to whom the advantages of such a route for extension of their commerce is proportionately greater in a degree almost beyond computation than it was believed in the fifteenth century that it would be, if discovered, to the Spain, or France, or England, of those days, or than it can be to them to-day when completed.

Chapter VII.

RAILROADS AND TRANSPORTATION.

The existing railroad system of Nicaragua consists of two separate divisions. The first commences at the port of Corinto, on the Pacific, and terminates at Momotombo, on the northwestern shore of Lake Managua, where it connects with the line of steamers plying on the lake.

The second division commences at the capital, Managua, on the southern shore of the lake of that name, and terminates at Granada, on the northwestern shore of Lake Nicaragua.

From Managua to

Sabana Grande..

Portillo...

Campuzano

Nindirí

Masaya

San Blas

Granada.

The distance from the port of Corinto is therefore:

Miles.

8

II

14

17

19

21

32