bankers' visit to Egypt--and astute Disraeli did the rest.

This transferred from France to her rival across the channel the right
to direct the policy of De Lesseps's creation. But French
susceptibilities have always been considered in matters connected with
the conduct of the enterprise--it is still "La Compagnie Universelle du
Canal Maritime de Suez," the tariff is based on French currency, the
principal office is in Paris, and the official language of the company
is French.

The world knows the Suez marine highway only in its utilitarian aspect,
and America's interest therein is that attaching to it as an enterprise
forerunning Uncle Sam's route at Panama. Before many years have passed
the two canals will to some extent be rivals. The Suez cutting is
practically ninety-nine miles in length, and at present 121 feet wide,
with a depth accommodating craft drawing twenty-six feet and three
inches. To handle modern battleships and the increasing size of cargo
steamers, both depth and width are to be increased. Having no sharp
curvatures, and excavated at a level from sea to sea, ships proceed by
night assisted by electric lights with the same facility as by day. The
time consumed in transit is from fourteen to eighteen hours. Not for a
decade has a sailing vessel used the canal, and the widest craft ever
traversing the canal was the dry-dock _Dewey_, sent under tow by the
government from the United States to the Philippines. The tariff is now
reduced to $1.70 per ton register, and $2 for every passenger. A ship's
crew pay nothing. The toll for a steamer of average size, like a
Peninsular and Orient liner, is about $10,000. I first passed the canal
in a yacht of the New York Yacht Club, for which the tax was $400, and
the last time I made the transit was in a German-Lloyd mail steamer
which paid $7,000 for tonnage and passengers.

The canal's value to the commerce of the world is sufficiently proved by
the saving of distance effected by it, as compared with the route around
the Cape of Good Hope. By the latter the distance between England and
Bombay is 10,860 miles, by the canal 4,620 miles, and from New York to
the leading ports of India the Cape route is about 11,500 miles, while
by the canal the journey is shortened to 7,900 miles. How rapidly the
traffic attracted by the economy in distance thus effected has
developed, is best illustrated by the following statement, taken
quinquennially from the company's returns: