In the meantime I made myself familiar with the wonderful American project which brought the Panama Republic into existence. The Canal then was a sorry sight. The public clamour in the United States was for “making the dirt fly,” but it did not look to a mere layman as if we could ever make it fly fast enough or in sufficient quantities to really bring the two oceans together. All along the line of operations the old French machinery lay buried in pathetic ruin in a tropic jungle which had all but effaced the evidences of the French enterprise, and such conditions of general unhealthiness prevailed as made it seem almost too much to expect that any kind of cleanup programme could be made effectual.

But all that story has been told; told in actual accomplishment with which all the world is familiar. I am only glad that I saw Colonel Gorgas and his men in that initial and contagious enthusiasm which, being sustained, resulted in a record of which we are all so proud.