Page:The Canal System of England.djvu/14



From the Writings of Herodotus, Aristotle, Pliny, and other ancient historians, we learn that canals existed in Egypt before the Christian era, and there is reason to believe that at the same early period, artificial inland navigation had also been introduced into China. Hardly anything, however, save their existence has been recorded of these early works. We know that the Greeks, and afterwards three of the Roman Emperors attempted to join the Ionian Sea and the Archipelago by a canal, but failed; and Pliny mentions that Drusus, commanding under Augustus an army which was to march into Germany, had a canal made from the now-known Rhine, to the Issel, for the sole purpose of conveying his army upon it.

Canals appear to have been introduced into Europe with the advent of the Christian era, but for many centuries their employment was very gradual.

Their first introduction into this country was by the Romans, when Britain, for a period of 400 years, was a province of the Roman Empire. The canals which the Romans constructed were designed for irrigation and water supply rather than for purposes of navigation. Such was one of the most notable of their canals, the "Foss-Dyke," extending from Lincoln to the Trent, a distance of eleven miles, concerning which Camden states in his