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Senator SIMMONS. As a matter of fact, did Mr. Nichols continue his borings along the line of this Gatun dam?

Mr. WALLACE. In that general vicinity; yes.

Senator SIMMONS. I am not speaking of the general vicinity. Did he make them along the line of this Gatun dam?

Mr. WALLACE. I could not tell you from memory. At that time I used to get monthly borings that he made. It has been almost a year now since I have paid any attention to it, and the data is not in my hands, so that I could not answer your question definitely.

Senator SIMMONS. Is there anything in the reports or upon the maps that indicate whether any borings were afterwards made right along the site?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir. Mr. Nichols made weekly and monthly reports of everything that he did, and the data as to exactly what he found and did are on file in the chief engineer's office, at Panama.

Senator SIMMONS. The data will show the exact location of the borings?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir.

Senator TALIAFERRO. You do not identify the borings that were conducted under your direction?

Mr. WALLACE. No, sir; if I had my reports here I could. I have reports of these borings. This map is made to a different scale and the borings are differently numbered from what they were on my reports, and I could not identify the exact borings.

Senator MORGAN. Mr. Chairman, I ask that the chairman call for those reports, or copies of them.

Senator SIMMONS. Yes; we would like to have them.

The CHAIRMAN. Do I understand that they are here or at Panama, Mr. Wallace?

Mr. WALLACE. Those are at Panama. It may be possible that you will find them in a consolidated annual report. Just before I left the Isthmus I commenced to shape up my matters for an annual report. All the engineers under me received instructions as to how to prepare their matter and what matter I wanted. Mr. Nichols and these other engineers that had charge of borings had everything tabulated up to the 1st of July, 1905. It is barely possible that copies of that matter may be here in the office of the Commission. I think very likely they may be.

The CHAIRMAN. There may be copies here of this work that was done at Panama?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir; there should be.

Senator TALIAFERRO. Could you not look over the annual report and ascertain whether this information was embraced in it?

Mr. WALLACE. Why, it would not be in the annual report. It would be in the reports of Mr. Dauchey, and Mr. List, and Mr. Maltby, and Mr. Ely, and Mr. Nichols, and these other assistant engineers. It would be in their reports to the chief engineer.

Senator MORGAN. Which you transmitted to the Commission?
Mr. WALLACE. No, sir; I did not get a chance to do that.

Senator SIMMONS. I would like to have inserted in the record the letters that Mr. Wallace referred to a few moments ago, which he says he wrote to the chairman of the Commission, giving it as his conclusion, as a result of his borings through these gorges there, that this place at Gatun, which has been selected by the minority as a

proper place for the construction of a dam, was not an available. place.

Senator KITTREDGE. I think that is a proper request.

Senator MORGAN. I thought those letters had been called for on my suggestion.

Senator SIMMONS. You spoke of reports.

Senator MORGAN. I call them reports.

The CHAIRMAN. These letters will be here, Mr. Wallace?

Mr. WALLACE. They should be here.

The CHAIRMAN. The request for the letters will be made, Senator. Senator TALIAFERRO. That was in the form of a report, was it? Mr. WALLACE. No, sir; it was in the form of my regular letters right along.

The CHAIRMAN. Those letters would be along in the year 1904? Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir; addressed to the chairman of the Commission.

Senator SIMMONS. In August or September of that year.

Mr. WALLACE. My recollection is that you will find that matter also treated in a report that I made to the Commission under date of February 1, 1905. Along about in the winter the Commission sent down an engineering committee consisting of Professor Burr, Mr. Parsons, and General Davis, and they called upon me for a report on the Isthmus, so that I made them a short, condensed report, and I think it was on February 1, 1905; and in that report I described the work that had been done up to date, and gave the conclusions that I had arrived at up to that date. That is very short, and it wound things up to that period.

Senator MORGAN. Probably that would cover the whole matter. Mr. WALLACE. That might cover what you want.

Senator SIMMONS. We would like to have that, and the other, too. The CHAIRMAN. I assume that all borings, or copies of them, are in the office here?

Mr. WALLACE. They should be; yes.

On the Isthmus the borings, cores of all the material, were very carefully preserved, showing the number of the hole and the character of material at each foot below the surface all the way down, so that you could examine the actual material. That is the way we got our information about these things. I used to visit these assistant engineers and go through these samples. I would say, for instance, "What did you find down here in hole No. 1 at 50 feet, or at 125 feet below the surface?" And I would follow that stuff down and see it, and take it in my hands, and consequently I knew.

Senator SIMMONS. Did you find any water currents down in that gulch?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir.

Senator SIMMONS. How deep were those?

Mr. WALLACE. The deeper down we went the more freely the water seemed to flow, although there were occasional thin layers of clay. Senator SIMMONS. What was the depth of the first current you found?

Mr. WALLACE. I do not remember.

Senator TALIAFERRO. It is on that blueprint there.

Mr. WALLACE. I do not like to speak from this blueprint, because I do not know whether this was made from my borings or from subse

quent ones. The general conclusion is all that concerns you, I suppose, and the effect that it had on my views was that it was not such a location for the dam

Senator SIMMONS. But every fact about this concerns us, in making up our opinion. We are glad to have your suggestions, but we have to form an opinion about it ourselves, and every fact about it is material.

Mr. WALLACE. Then I would go down there, if I were you, and look at the samples of those borings.

Senator MORGAN. Did you have a paper similar to that blueprint, or some other drawing showing the borings made by you and reported by you to the Commission?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir; it came in on the monthly reports. They were sections. For instance, if they took these particular borings in a month [indicating on profile], or those there [indicating], they would send sections like that; but not a completed section like this blueprint.

Senator MORGAN. Your borings are in charge of the Commission? Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir.

Senator MORGAN. And that map, or those maps?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir.

Senator MORGAN. We want those, Mr. Chairman.

Senator KITTREDGE. Is it possible, Mr. Wallace, to secure a rock foundation in the gorges you have described?

Mr. WALLACE. I do not think so.

Senator KITTREDGE. The depth is too great?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir; the depth is too great.

Senator KITTREDGE. Is it possible to put in a curtain wall of the character you have mentioned, in such manner as that you can certainly say that all the water will be cut off?

Mr. WALLACE. Well, that word "possible" makes it a hard question to answer, Senator.

Senator KITTREDGE. Is it probable?

Mr. WALLACE. It is possible, but I would not consider it reasonably practicable. To put it in a little different way, if it was the only location that there was anywhere for a dam, and we could not build the Panama Canal unless we put the dam at that particular point, I should first try, if I had anything to do with the work, or in the way of advising any engineer that had anything to do with it, to attempt to shut these gorges off in some way. It would be a very expensive, tedious proposition, but it might be possible to do it. I would not like to say that it would be impossible. I would say, most positively, that I would not attempt it for a moment if there was, any other locality where I could build a dam where I would not have these difficulties, and which would still enable me to build the Panama Canal.

Senator MORGAN. You would not recommend it to a client as a safe operation for investment?

Mr. WALLACE. I certainly would not.

Senator KITTREDGE. Is it beyond tried experience?

Mr. WALLACE. It is beyond anything that has been done in an engineering way.

Senator MORGAN. I want to get a better idea than I have of the topography of this country between Bohio and the site of the Gatun

dam, as put down on the report of the minority. What is about the distance between the borings at Gatun that you made down to 157 feet and-how many feet was it?

Mr. WALLACE. To a maximum depth of 200 feet while I was there. Senator MORGAN. At Bohio?

Mr. WALLACE. Oh; at Bohio? One hundred and sixty-seven feet. Senator MORGAN. State the distance from that line to Gatun, just in miles, if you please.

Mr. WALLACE. It is practically about 10 miles.

Senator MORGAN. At Bohio you bored across and developed a deep gulch?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir.

Senator MORGAN. And you got to real rock, solid rock?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir.

Senator MORGAN. Not this indurated clay?

Mr. WALLACE. No, sir.

Senator MORGAN. And there you found bowlders washed in?
Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir.

Senator MORGAN. And lodged in this gulch?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir.

Senator MORGAN. In your borings between that and Gatun, did you develop the continuity or a prolongation of this gulch?

Mr. WALLACE. Not from Bohio down to Gatun; but we took borings from Gatun up the river some distance.

Senator MORGAN. I know that; but down below?

Mr. WALLACE. We did not go below Bohio, because there was no site between Bohio and Gatun where we considered the conditionsthat is, the topography of the country above the surface-as suitable for a dam.

Senator MORGAN. This blueprint that you have been speaking from this morning indicates that there are two deep gulches there; one, the narrower one, is how many feet deep?

Mr. WALLACE. It is 250 feet deep.

Senator MORGAN. And the wider one is how deep?

Mr. WALLACE. About 200 feet.

Senator TALIAFERRO. That deep gulch is 258 feet deep, is it not? Mr. WALLACE. I was just speaking approximately from what this map said. I was not pretending to give exact figures. It is shown here on this map as being 260 feet.

Senator MORGAN. Yes.

Mr. WALLACE. Yes. I had always understood that it was called 250 feet in depth. There is one boring that goes down 10 feet below, here [indicating on map].

Senator TALIAFERRO. The borings there, I understood, have gone down 258 feet.

Mr. WALLACE. I see one figure on here marked 260.

Senator MORGAN. I want to get you to state, if you please, whether the Chagres River in its present location runs over or above either of these borings.

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir; that is, in a way. There is, a diversion channel over this deepest boring which was made by the French. The Chagres River is not over the deepest boring, but both the diversion and the river itself are inside of the limits of these gorges, only above them.

Senator MORGAN. Does the Chagres River separate into two channels there, so as to make an island between?

Mr. WALLACE. In connection with this diversion channel it does. The French made a diversion there that I presume followed the lines of what formerly had been a river. I think there is no doubt but what at some ancient period there were two channels, one in each of these beds.

Senator MORGAN. And there was an island that appeared on the topographic surface?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir.

Senator MORGAN. And through one of those channels the French dug a diversion channel?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir.

Senator MORGAN. Have you any information as to the purpose for which they dug that channel?

Mr. WALLACE. Well, that was to keep the side water that came in from flowing into the canal. The general theory of diversion channels was this: That on each side of the canal itself channels would be cut from one depression to another, or one part of the river bed to another, so that it would intercept the streams that came down on the hills on each side, carrying that water out to sea, to keep it from running into the canal proper.

Senator MORGAN. And the diversion that you speak of was a part of that scheme for keeping the water out of the canal?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir.

Senator MORGAN. In the borings, as indicated on this blueprint, the augers were put down through that diversion and also through the main channel of the river?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir.

Senator MORGAN. And this insular mass was between the two?
Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir.

Senator MORGAN. And that insular mass was composed of indurated clay?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir.

Senator MORGAN. And the gulches between had washed out and been filled up with débris from some more elevated place? Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir.

Senator MORGAN. The insulated mass-I mean the general body of the material lying from 40 to 50 feet beneath the surface-was this indurated clay?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes. I mean this indurated clay was on the sides, but there was no continuity across these gorges of indurated clay. Senator MORGAN. I understand. I suppose of course it is a supposition with you and everybody else that that indurated clay had been deposited there in some far distant period of the past and that those gorges had washed out?

Mr. WALLACE. Yes, sir.

Senator MORGAN. And had left an island between the two, which is demarked on the surface to-day by these two branches of the Chagres River which run around it?

Mr. WALLACE. That is the natural supposition.

Senator MORGAN. Did they ever, in the borings that they made as shown on this blueprint, reach solid rock beneath this indurated clay?

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