A small space may be given to the probable revenue. The moderate estimate given in Admiral Davis’s report may be assumed as a basis, which may be safety taken as doubling itself in ten years.
The tonnage which would pass the Isthmus yearly is, at one dollar per ton toll, $3,094,070.
| At end of the | first | year | $ 3,403,477 |
| ““ | second | “ | 3,712,884 |
| ““ | third | “ | 4,022,291 |
| ““ | fourth | “ | 4,331,698 |
| ““ | fifth | “ | 4,641,105 |
| ““ | sixth | “ | 4,950,512 |
| ““ | seventh | “ | 5,259,919 |
| ““ | eighth | “ | 5,569,326 |
| ““ | ninth | “ | 5,878,733 |
| ““ | tenth | “ | 6,188,140 |
| Gross receipts for tolls during ten years | $47,958,085 | ||
This estimate is undoubtedly less than the revenue which will be received.
No conjectural estimate is made of the probable development of the agricultural and mineral wealth of the valleys of the Mississippi and the Amazon, of the shores of the Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean Sea, and Pacific coast of America. And yet, in attempting to form an idea of the probable revenue and actual value of this canal, all the industrial resources called into being by its influence should be taken into consideration. It is like opening the gate to commerce, which, for centuries, man has struggled to unlock.
No event in history has been followed by more marvelous consequences than the discovery of Columbus. So closely is man bound up with matter, that every conquest of nature not only adds to his material comfort, but opens new fields for the moral and intellectual progress of the race. America not only opened new industrial resources, but afforded the population of Europe an opportunity to escape from the social, moral, and physical oppression of caste, bigotry, and capital, which had become intolerable.
If we could lift the veil which conceals the future, and could see “the vision of the world and the wonder that will be,” it is not improbable that we should see the vast elements of progress latent in the American continents, working out their legitimate and logical results, as wonderful as those which have transpired since the colonization of America.
We should see the industrial resources—which have drawn thither in the struggle for existence the most energetic of the races of the globe—giving occupation to a happy and united people. The hum of industry, and the din of the steam hammers, would mingle together with smoke of furnaces and of factories, above the inexhaustible coal fields of Pennsylvania, Virginia, Illinois, and Iowa. The grain of Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana, and Kansas would be shipped to New Orleans, to be exchanged for the cotton and sugar of the South, and the coffee, dyes, and tobacco of Costa Rico, Havana, and Ambelema; the magnificent table lands of Mexico, Guatemala, Yucatan, and the plateau of Bogotá, occupied by a people more highly cultivated and capable of appreciating the grandeur of the scenery and salubrity of the climate, and of utilizing the fertility of the soil and the physical advantages of those most favored regions.
Opulent cities would spring up in the bays of Tampa, Mobile, and Pensacola. New Orleans, Galveston, and Vera Cruz would rival Marseilles and ancient Venice. From the ports of Carthagena, Sabanilla, Maracaibo, and Para, would be shipped the produce of the valleys of the Magdelina and the Amazon. Great as would be the transformations effected by these changes, they would be less than those which have transformed the continent of America into a congeries of civilized States.
Such speculations have a sober basis of fact. They are not wholly useless if they attract the attention of those who have more time for patient investigation. Sufficient has been said to show that the objects to be attained merit consideration.