forbear to upbraid him at least with the want of all God-like characteristics in the being to whose worship his talents are perforce devoted; let them rather admire the honesty and the skill with which he works out, in massive structure or in rock-hewn cave, those ideas of fear and gloom with which his religion associates divinity; and let them picture to themselves the far happier effects no doubt destined to be realised at some future time, by that patient fidelity and that untiring zeal, when at length worthily consecrated to the service of a religion, not of gloom and fear, but of light and love.

1.

ART. V.-RIVAL ROUTES FROM ENGLAND TO

INDIA.

The Isthmus of Suez Question. By FERDINAND de LesSEPS, Minister Plenipotentiary. "Aperire terram gentibus." London: Longman and Co.; 1855.

With

2. New Facts and Figures relative to the Isthmus of Suez Canal. Edited by M. FERDINAND DE LESSEPS. a Reply to the Edinburgh Review, by M. BARTHELEMY ST. HILAIR, Member of the Institute of France. London: E. Wilson; 1856.

3. Percement de l'Isthme de Suez. Rapport et Projet de la Commission Internationale. Troisième Série. Paris: Henry Plow; 1856.

4. British Interests in the Canalisation of the Isthmus of Suez. Glasgow R. Rae; 1856.

5. Communications with the Far East. FRASER's Magazine, No. CCCXXIII., November 1856.

6.

The Gates of the East. Ten Chapters on the Isthmus of
Suez Canal. By CHARLES LAMB KENNEY, of the Inner
Temple, Barrister at-law. London: Ward and Lock,
158, Fleet Street; 1857.

7. The Suez Canal and the Euphrates. RAILWAY MONTHLY REVIEW, NO. XV., February 1857.

The Edinburgh Review, No. 209, Art. IX., January 1856.

Schemes in the field.

329

8. L'Isthme de Suez. JOURNAL DE L'UNION DES DEUX MERS. Paris.

9. The Euphrates Valley Railway and Indo-European Telegraph. Reprinted from BENTLEY'S MISCELLANY. London: E. Stanford, 6, Charing Cross; 1856.

10. Memoirs on the Euphrates Valley Route to India; with official Correspondence and Maps. By W. P. ANDREW, F.R.G.S., Chairman of the Scinde Railway, the Euphrates Valley Railway, and the European and Indian Junction Telegraph Companies. London: Allen and

Co.; 1857.

11. The Euphrates Valley Route to India. An Examination of the Memoir published by Mr. W. P. Andrew, F.R.G.S. By TWO TRAVELLERS, authors of " Nothing in Particular." "Cantabit vacuus coram latrone viator.' London: Railway Times Office; 1857.

2nd Edition.

THE long list of publications we have noted is in itself a sufficient proof that the question of the creation of a new route from England to India is at length likely to receive a portion of that attention which it deserves. When we speak of a route from England to India, we mean a route from England to the far East generally, for the question of the route and its line must be decided before it reaches Indian waters. The Mediterranean, the Persian Gulf, and the Gulf of Arabia-these are the points chiefly to be considered in the question of creating a new route between Southampton and Bombay, and it is on these points that public attention in England has at length been directed by the writings of Mons. de Lesseps, Mr. Kenney, and Mr. Andrew, in whose wake follow, as usual, a posse of minor and anonymous pamphleteers. The question of routes to the East has, by these publications, been reduced to a very simple issue. Many of the schemes which a few years ago stirred up the more imaginative minds among the Perotes and Smyrniotes have been shelved, because they were fit for nothing but the vapouring talk of Levantine coffee-houses, and because they evaporated under the influence of anything like a close inspection. The only schemes now in the field are those advocated respectively by Mons. de Lesseps and Mr. Andrew, the Chairman of the Sind Railway. The one proposes to make the present overland route through Egypt available for trade and navigation, by cutting a ship canal of less than ninety miles in length through the Isthmus of Suez. The

other extols the superior merits of a railway from Seleucia to Bassorah, from the Mediterranean to the Persian Gulf. In the present rude state of the latter project, it is impossible to state with any degree of certainty the length of the proposed line. General Chesney, who has devoted his life to, and sustained it by, the Euphrates route, estimates the length of the line from sea to sea at 660 miles. Mr. Andrew, who might reasonably be expected to have precise information as to the length of the line of railway he proposes, says the distance is 800 miles. The London Times -we do not know on what authority-quotes the distance as not exceeding 900 miles, and lastly, a French engineer, M. Jules Falkowski, whom Mr. Andrew quotes as an authority for the feasibility of his project, assures us that the railway from Seleucia to Bassorah would be about 1,233 miles in length. This last quotation tallies with our own impression as to the length of the way from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean, and it is moreover confirmed by the opinion of the Calcutta Englishman, to the effect that the distance from the bar of the Euphrates to Seleucia is full 1,080 miles. So that we need not fear to be put to shame by the results of the measurements which are now being made, when we describe Mr. Andrew's project as an attempt to connect the Persian Gulf with the Mediterranean by means of a railway 1,000 miles in length.

The proposed Suez canal has, in England, been cordially supported by the ship-owners and manufacturers; it is a favourite with all those classes whose material interests are concerned in an extension of the British trade with India, China, and Australia. But from all we can learn, the scheme is but coldly received in political circles; and the great London newspapers, all of which are either connected with, or influenced by, the Government, have studiously avoided entering upon any discussion as to its merits. The promoters of the Suez canal, a numerous and influential body, please themselves by interpreting this scheme as most favourable to their cause. They assert-if any reasonable objections should be urged against the practicability of their schemethat there are plenty of pens ready to seize the opportunity of crushing a project which, for some reason or other, is not countenanced by those in power. They assure us that the majority of the great London journals shrink from attacking the Suez canal scheme, because of their inward conviction of its merits; and that they decline supporting it, simply because the gentleman at the head of the undertaking happens to be-not an Englishman, We record the expression of this opinion, but we cannot say that

we share it. Such pitiable considerations like the one imputed to the conductors of the great London journals cannot have weight with The Times, for instance, which owes part of its present prosperity to the successful managership of an Alziger, of Bavarian or Swiss extraction, as shown by the name. The imputation of such a motive passes all belief in a country in which a Lefevre has presided over the House of Commons, in which a Labouchere is a member of the Cabinet, while a Disraeli is the leader of the Opposition. But be this as it may, a marked hostility has been shown to the Suez canal scheme, and certainly one of the most peculiar features of that hostility is, that it has invariably shrunk from the light of day. It has been pertinacious but unavowed. "So evident," says Mr. Kenney, the advocate of the Suez canal scheme," so evident and incontestible are the political advantages which the Suez canal offers to England, that though the subject has been discussed by the organs of parties of the most varied opinions, there has not up to the present day been a single voice raised in opposition to the plan on political grounds. If such objections exist in any quarter,-if timid minds there are with misgivings lest so great a change might open the door to some great and unforeseen danger,-those minds have at least had the modesty to make what political objections occurred to them in the profoundest secrecy.' "'* This sounds very much like a challenge, and doubtlessly it was meant as such, for a few pages further on Mr. Kenney says:-" What is desired for the Suez canal scheme is an examination of all its features. Its promoters, strong in the strength of their scheme, solicit controversy and defy it." Up to the time to which our information reaches, the challenge remained unanswered.

It is true that more than a year ago, not the political but the commercial and engineering prospects of the Suez canal scheme were made the subject of a virulent article in the Edinburgh Review-a periodical which, after passing through the hands of the present Chancellor of the Exchequer, has fallen under the management of a gentleman who holds a clerkship in the Privy Council office. It was therefore by no means an unwarrantable assumption, that the animosity displayed by the Edinburgh Review against the Suez canal scheme was inspired by Government, and intended to justify the coolness with which Lord Clarendon considered the project, and the rancorous hostility with which its progress through the Sultan's Council had been obstructed by Lord Stratford de Redcliffe. But that Government should attempt discre

"The Gates of the East," page 58.

diting the project it abhors, on commercial instead of on political grounds, is in itself an anomaly which at the time created some sensation in England, and which has since been ably commented upon by a distinguished contributor to the Monthly Review.

"We are told by the organs of authority," (proceeds the writer,) "and particularly by the Edinburgh Review, that there is no political ground for this extraordinary opposition on the part of England. It is indeed said that the shareholders (principally French and English) of the canal company would lose, and that Government is anxious to avert such a calamity. This is the first time we have observed such a parental desire on the part of Government to take care of our pockets and of the pockets of their allies."*

The exceptions which the Edinburgh Review made to the Suez canal scheme were founded on the preliminary project for the canal elaborated by Messrs. Tinant and Monzel Bey, engineers to the Viceroy of Egypt, and the article was published just when this preliminary project was, on the spot itself, being subjected to the consideration and improvement of a congress of engineers and naval officers, convoked from all nations of Europe for the elaboration of a definitive scheme. In this scientific commission England was represented by the late Mr. Rendel and by Mr. MacClean, and India by Captain Harris, of the Hon. East India Company's navy, while the commission in the elaboration of its report had the assistance of Mr. Charles Manby. Of the existence of this commission the Edinburgh Reviewer was by no means ignorant, and he hastened to assail the scheme in its imperfect state, probably because he feared that there would be nothing to say against it after it had passed through the ordeal of a commission such as the one assembled in Egypt to consider the technical features of the proposed canal. The report of the commission has since been published in a volume of 376 pages. It is accompanied by an atlas of maps and plans. It embraces the whole of the plan of the canalisation of the Isthmus of Suez in all its features, and enters into the minutest details. The resultsthe borings in the track of the proposed canal, the soundings of the Bay of Pelusium and the Red Sea at Suez, the observations in winds, currents, and tides, the calculations of the cost of materials and labour,-are all summed up even to the apparently most trivial details, and given with a conscientiousness and correctness which has rarely been equalled in the preliminaries to similar undertakings. Never did any similar undertaking obtain so full and unreserved a sanction from the representatives Monthly Review, page 73.