e great tower of Paris, was found
guilty of breach of trust, and sentenced to two years' imprisonment and
a fine of 20,000 francs. Nine persons were then charged with receiving
bribes, one of whom, M. Baihaut, admitted that he got 375,000 francs.
Three were found guilty, sentenced to imprisonment, fines, and to pay
the liquidators of the company the amount of M. Baihaut's bribe. Charles
de Lesseps appealed against the charges of swindling, and these were
quashed on the ground that the transactions had occurred more than five
years before, thus getting the longer terms of imprisonment and fines of
the three principals reduced.

Ferdinand de Lesseps hardly knew what was going on; he was old, feeble,
and in a state of apathy and stupor. Pity for his condition prevented
the carrying out of the sentence as far as he was concerned, and he died
on the 7th of December, 1894. The _Times_, in noticing his death, said
the story was a most pitiful one. The blame of the Panama affair must be
laid upon the people and the public temper. Bribery and corruption were
symptoms of a thoroughly unhealthy state of things. An infatuated public
provided enormous sums; when these were spent, more went the same way,
and to get these contributions everything possible was done. Lesseps was
no engineer, but a diplomatist, planning great schemes and the means of
carrying them out. He was the man of the moment in France. He was
neither a financier nor an engineer, neither an impostor nor a swindler.
He was a man of great originality, of indomitable perseverance, of
boundless faith in himself, and of singular powers of fascination over
others.

Meanwhile several attempts had been made to get money to carry on the
work, one of which was by means of a lottery. But the French people were
discouraged, and were no longer prepared to throw good money after bad.
It followed, therefore, that although in 1894 a new company, with a
capital of sixty-five million francs, was proposed, and that it was
announced in August that eight hundred workmen were engaged, it does not
appear that anything is being done. If, as has been stated, only a third
of the work has been accomplished for, say, thirty millions, allowing
for waste of money, it can hardly be expected that double this amount
will ever be obtained. What with the heavy floods and rank vegetation, a
great deal will have to be done to recover lost ground; in fact, some of
the excavations must be filled up by t