SIMPKIN, MARSHALL, AND CO., STATIONERS' HALL COURT ;

AND

J. D. POTTER, 31, POULTRY, AND 11, KING STREET,

TOWER HILL.

THE

NAUTICAL MAGAZINE

AND

Naval Chronicle.

JANUARY, 1867.

THE PROPOSED NICARAGUA LINE TO THE PACIFIC.

In all gigantic enterprises, it should not be forgotten that the words of the enthusiast must be received with extreme caution; for historical records prove that the greatest commercial failures which have ever fallen on the people of this country may be traced to the singular influence which a daring speculative mind, on certain occasions, is enabled to establish over his fellow-men. Do we turn to the great South Sea or the Mississippi schemes of the last century, or that of the end of the previous century called New Caledonia*, or the railway mania of our own times?—we see at once how blindly the wisest rush into ruinous speculation without a thought of their possible failure.

If a stranger to Nicaragua and its deadly swamps were to form his idea of the country from Capt. Pim's glowing description, he would imagine it to be one of the healthiest climates of the globe. Would that I could echo the words of his report. But a long experience of the particular locality which he mentions compels me to state that I have ever found it to be one of the most trying to which a white man can be exposed. How can it be otherwise when the great accessories to disease in the tropics are present, in the shape of swamp, heat, and rank decaying vegetation.

The fact of the Gorgon being enabled to work in to Monkey Bay proves that the favourable season of the year, when the N.E. trade wind blows home, had set in; and therefore it is not surprising that under such circumstances a robust well-fed Englishman should be * See Nautical Magazine, 1853.

NO. 1.-VOL. XXXVI.

B