(1.) It will render greater service to the New World than the Suez Canal does to the Old. (2.) It will bring Japan, Northern China, Australasia, and part of Malaysia nearer to the Atlantic cities of the United States than they are now to England. (3.) It will benefit America in an infinitely greater degree than it will Europe, which will only use the canal in trading with the Pacific littoral of the two Americas, the South Sea Islands, and possibly New Zealand. (4.) It will divert little or no European traffic from the Suez Canal. (5.) It will give an immense impulse to United States manufactures, especially cotton and iron, and will greatly stimulate the shipbuilding industry and the development of the naval power of the United States. (6.) It will cost more than the estimates show, but it will have a traffic greater than is usually admitted. (7.) In the interests of the world it must be neutralized, and the true policy of the United States is to forward that end and thus make of this international highway a powerful factor for the preservation of peace. I believe that the canal can be made, and that, long hindered by political difficulties alone, it will now be carried out under the auspices of the United States Government. The canal is a necessity of the age, and, were the cost double what I estimate it to be, the immense benefits certain to result would amply justify its execution. It will bind together the remote sections of that immense country, assimilate its diverse interests, go far towards solving many difficult problems, and make the United States still more united. Finally, I believe it will, taken in connection with the vast changes occurring in the Far East, bring about the most serious rivalry to the commercial supremacy of Great Britain which she has yet had to encounter. APPENDIX I. THE CLAYTON AND BULWER CONVENTION, OF THE 19TH APRIL, 1850, BETWEEN THE BRITISH AND AMERICAN GOVERNMENTS, CONCERNING CENTRAL AMERICA. Convention between the United States of America and her Britannic Majesty, for Facilitating and Protecting the Construction of a Ship-canal between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, and for other purposes. Concluded 19th April, 1850; ratified by the United States, 23rd May, 1850; exchanged, 4th July, 1850; and proclaimed by the United States, 5th July, 1850. By the President of the United States of America. A Proclamation. Whereas a convention between the United States of America and her Britannic Majesty, for facilitating and protecting the construction of a ship-canal between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, and for other purposes, was concluded and signed at Washington on the 19th day of April last, which convention is, word for word, as follows: Convention between the United States of America and The United States of America and her Britannic Majesty, being desirous of consolidating the relations of amity which so happily subsist between them, by setting forth and fixing in a convention their views. and intentions with reference to any means of communication by shipcanal which may be constructed between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, by the way of the river San Juan de Nicaragua, and either or both of the lakes of Nicaragua or Managua, to any port or place on the |