BIG UNDERTAKINGS.
Nothing seems too big for the present age, for we are continually being startled with something new and something immense, which has either been just completed, or is about to be carried out, or, at anyrate, is projected or proposed. Within the last few weeks three new schemes have been either commenced or suggested in Switzerland, Greece, and Canada. The first-named scheme in Switzerland is proposed by an Italian engineer named Agudio, of Milan, for making a way through the Simplon, which he declares he can do by a tunnel of only six thousand and fifty metres, the traction and haulage being done by hydraulic power. He says that by this means from three to four thousand tons of goods could be safely transported without any breaking-up or trans-shipment of trains; while the cost of the whole proceeding would be only twenty-eight millions of francs.
Number Two project consists of the bold but practical scheme of draining the Lake of Copaïs, near Thebes, in Bœotia, by which an area of a hundred square miles will be added to the territory of Greece. The acquiring of so very large a piece of land, which may be put to useful purposes, though undoubtedly one of vast importance, is not the only object intended to be effected by the proposal—the other being the destruction of one of the greatest fever-producing places in the country by reason of the pestilential malaria always arising from the waters of this lake. This alone would be an unspeakable blessing to the country round, and money should be readily forthcoming for the carrying out of so beneficial an undertaking. The rivers now flowing into the lake would be employed for irrigation and other purposes of practical utility.
Number Three project proposes to connect Prince Edward Island with the Canadian mainland by means of a submarine railway tunnel, by which all communication can be kept open with the inhabitants of the island during the winter, a circumstance at present almost impossible, from the terribly rigorous nature of the winter climate of Canada; but Canada is bound legally to do everything that is possible to keep open a communication with this island at all times and by all means, for the accommodation and assistance of the hundred and twenty-five thousand persons who constitute the present population. The distance of the island is only six miles and a half, and the bed of the Northumberland Straits, under which the railway will be carried, presents no very apparent difficulties. The depth of water is on the island side thirty-six feet; and ten feet six inches on the New Brunswick side; and about eighty feet in the middle. The tunnel will be eighteen feet in diameter, and will be made of ‘chilled white cast-iron,’ in sections, these latter being bolted together with inside flanges, exactly in the same way in which the little tunnel for foot-passengers under the Thames, and known as the ‘Tower Subway,’ was constructed some years ago. The cost of this undertaking is estimated at about one million sterling. It has been well considered and highly commended, and will be brought before the Canadian parliament very speedily, when the scheme will no doubt be fully sanctioned, as it has many warm supporters in the Legislative Assembly. Canada will therefore have her ‘submarine railway’ long before her illustrious ‘mother’ on this side the Atlantic.