Great INTERPRISES

Te Aroha News, Volume V, Issue 264, 16 May 1888, Page 6

Great INTERPRISES

TuiKi ii nothing in tin* hi-toi\ (if the wOlw 01 Id th.'il. is moio icmarLible than the loi inul.tble and co-lly works that ha\e lilcii undertaken m oiu a<je to annihilate space and time and piomote ea-o and economy ot ttan.-port. iMery modem nation ha- contuhuted it- quota to Uiis movement. Ureat Kntain his been the pioneei ol the i.ulway -,\stem, and ha*-, besides, consunoted a system ot canals, some 4,000 mile- in extent, and ii)\ol\in<> an expondituieot 160,000,000 to C70,00U,0G0, vJueh, Lhouuh tai horn bein^. a- usrtul as it mi^ht. be made, and ideally o\ei -shadowed liy tlu oininpotLiit and omiiipiociiL non ua\, is Mill iound ol }.;ieat. .id\antago in the tian.sporl ot liea\y eoininoditieh. In Kianco canal na\i'4ation is much moie \ahu'd and ulilined than in EnuLind, and t.he \\aterwa\s <ue t-peeially looked aftoi by the ( JoxeinmenO, which ha.s leccntly undei taken a liiij^o expenditure tor their turther development. (iermany, like France, has a canal .s.y;->lo!n ot coi^idoivible extent, and has in hand at the pic.sent time two important links, in the chain ot such communication*— a canal 160 mile* lon^, trom J)ortmund to Emdcn llaibour, which in t,o cost, 13,2 33,000, and the impio\ement ot the na\ gallon liom the Odei lit L^iustenbei^ to thelJ])per at !>eih.», a distance ot 64 mile^, .it an estimated coht ot L' 630,000. Ifuithei eabt the itithmu.s ot Coiinth has almost been pieiced by a. canal which coni neets the Moditoi lauean and the Adiiatic I >vith the Archipelago and the JUtick Hea, thu* hhortonii)<i the distance between I'ua-euh and Marbeilles by 11 per cent, while (ienoa is brouuht neaioi by 12, Venice and Trieste by 18. and Brmdisi by 32 pur cent. Tito lun^th of this ca.ua! is, howevei, (;nly iour miles, the greatest depih of euLtiii;^ l)einy, 23b tool, and the total amount ol exca\atiou beiu^ übtnnattd at 13,000,000 cubic yaicU Kus&ia, again, recently completed a maritime canal between Consiadt and St. I'etcKsbur^, eighteen miles in length and twcnty-tw r o feet in dopth, o\ei a floor 276 toot in width. r J'hi,s canal, howexei. wis a eompai atively easy undoi'takin^. It was cub thiou^h the hubmorged delta ot the Neva, in a depth of water vaiyin^ Irom eight feet, near St. Poteibburg, to twenty toot near Constadb. — The " Ifortnightly Ivoviow."'