Page:Mexico as it was and as it is.djvu/452



In the above table, the distance to Behring's Straits and the ports that follow, is given to satisfy the reader's curiosity, and not with a view to any practical utility, in the way of Steam Navigation, unless greatly improved and cheapened. It is not impossible that chemists may discover some new power, equal to steam, and producible at less expense, or that our engineers may invent some mechanical mode of propulsion for vessels, rendering the Isthmus of Panama the most direct and expeditious route, not only to these ports, but to Manila and the whole Eastern Archipelago.

It will be seen from this table, that the British settlement on the Columbia river might be reached from Panama, by steam, in nineteen days, or say about forty days from England. By the same route, the important port of San Francisco might be reached in sixteen days from Panama, or thirty-six from England; and the Russsian settlement at La Bodega, in about six hours longer time. What a change in our communications, when the nearest Russian settlement on the west coast of America, will be brought within thirty-six days and six hours steaming, from our own shores; when even St Peter and St Paul, in Kamschatka, will be within fifty days, steaming; Jedo, within fifty-seven; Canton, within sixty-four, and Woahoo, in the Sandwich Islands, within forty-two days! Such are the wonderful results, that sooner or later may be expected from the mere power of steam, (improved and cheapened, as it may be, by fresh discoveries,) and the resumption of the old line of communication between Europe and the Pacific, via Chagres and Panama.