CHAPTER XI PREPARING FOR OPERATION 1 THE progress that has been made in the construction of the Canal during the twelve months since this volume first appeared, is amazing even to one who has been familiar with the operation from the time when the French controlled it. At the close of the year 1911, the enormous lock chambers are almost completed and their great gates are in course of erection; less than ten per cent. of the excavation in the Culebra Cut remains to be done; the site of Lake Gatun is being cleared preparatory to letting the Chagres River into it. In short, all along the line, work is in its final stage. Those who would see the Canal to the best advantage must do so within the next few months. Now, and for a little while hence, it will be possible to perceive what has been done, as well as to conceive the form of 1 This chapter, and that following, have been added to the present edition in order that the very latest information may be given as to the progress of the canal and of the country itself. the finished structure. Not so when the operation is completed. After the water is let into the works the gigantic proportions of the locks will not be appreciable to the full extent and SIDEWALL OF LOCKS COMPARED WITH A SIX STORY BUILDING the great dam will look like a low, commonplace hill, covered with vegetation. As Colonel Goethals said to the writer: "When the taxpayer comes through the Canal, two years hence, he will ask, Where is that costly dam about which so much fuss was made?'"' The Chief Engineer and his aides are confident that the waterway will be in a state to admit the passage of vessels from one ocean to the other at a date not later than July 1, 1913. It will not, however, be thrown open to general traffic until after several months of test and experiment. The attitude of the American press and public toward the undertaking has undergone a great change in the past few years. Shortly before the inauguration of President Taft a trivial slide at Gatun excited the country to such an extent that the Administration deemed it necessary to send a special commission to the Isthmus for the purpose of investigating the circumstances. Since that time several slides of more serious nature have occurred without attracting extraordinary notice, al though the Commission frankly describes all such occurrences in its weekly publication, the Canal Record. There are twenty-one slides of varying extent along the Culebra Cut, the largest being that at Cucaracha, covering an area of fortyseven acres. The movement here started in 1884, and is still active. Since July, 1905, over nine million cubic yards of extra excava |