Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 32.djvu/468

452 The following table shows the total excavation in both canal and derivations. The figures are those of the Canal Company, expressed in cubic metres:

According to these statistics the total cube of canal and deflections was 105,090,000 cubic metres; the amount excavated is 31,920,000 cubic metres, leaving 73,170,000 to be removed. In other words, thirty per cent of the work is finished, and seventy per cent remains. The deflections are nearly half finished. The principal machine-shops are at Colon, Matachin, and Panama, These, with the hospitals and quarters for officials and laborers, if placed side by side, would cover an area of eighty-one acres. They are frame-buildings, picturesquely situated, with sills resting on masonry supports, and roofs of corrugated iron. They are clean, well-ventilated, and admirably suited to the climate of the Isthmus. The "cantines" are kept by Chinamen, who board the laborers at reasonable rates. The native huts are unhealthy; the vegetable matter of a thatched roof decays and becomes a harbor for insects. The present quarters are decidedly in the line of economy both as regards health and future expense and needs. I visited the Isthmus in 1881, when the country was a thickly-matted jungle, the only signs of habitation being a few huts at railway-stations. To-day thousands of acres are cleared, and such is the installation of the company that the canal seems to lie in a prosperous and populous district. In fact, the passenger from Matachin to Culebra is reminded rather of a single settlement than of several railway-stations.

At the time of my visit 10,640 workmen were employed by the contractors; with the 926 employés of the company, the total force was 11,566 men. The laborers are chiefly negroes from Jamaica or other islands, with a few from our Southern States, who have gone to Colon in coasting-vessels, and have been attracted by the wages of $1.50 per day in Colombian coin. About 300 Kroomen and as many