THE SUEZ CANAL. LETTERS AND DOCUMENTS DESCRIPTIVE OF BY FERDINAND DE LESSEPS. TRANSLATED BY N. D'ANVERS, AUTHOR OF "THE ELEMENTARY HISTORY OF ART," ETC. HENRY S. KING AND CO., LONDON. 1876. 186. e. TO THE MEMBERS OF THE ACADEMY OF SCIENCES, PARIS. I OWE the distinguished honour of my seat in the Academy of Sciences to the execution of the Suez Canal. My colleagues have expressed a wish to know the history of the labours they have so frequently aided by their assistance and influence, and which, spread over a period of twenty years, have resulted in a successful completion of the work, supported as it has been by the verdict of Science and the progress of Civilisation. It is not for me to compile a complete history of an enterprise in which much opposition and contest, years before the formation of a financial company, necessarily compelled me to make myself conspicuous. But, in order to prepare an outline of the history and to comply with the wish of the Academy, I have collected my private and official correspondence, together with such of my notes as have been written according to the requirements of events as they occurred. This collection contains an account of the principal circumstances which occurred during and after the opening of the Egyptian Bosphorus to navigation, an occasion honoured by the presence of a numerous deputation of members of the Institute of France. FERD. DE LESSEPS. PARIS, May 1875. |