But for the bad climatic and health conditions, the Panama Canal would have been finished long ere this, and had the De Lesseps company had the advantages of modern sanitary methods, the history of the canal might be different. In England it has been customary to hear exaggerated accounts of wasted money and material in Panama until the very name is almost synonymous with fraud and deceit. But on the spot the American engineers have discovered many evidences of the enormous amount of genuine work accomplished by the early companies, under depressing circumstances and difficulties. Much that they did has been utilised, houses, hospitals, and hotels have been put into order, and have proved of great assistance to the present owners. The task of keeping up a working force of thirty thousand men, feeding, housing, and caring for them, can only be appreciated by those who are acquainted with the tropics. As all nationalities are to be found in the vast army at work, this means that the labour camps to accommodate them have to be kept separate and the food supplies carefully chosen, in accordance with the various tastes of different nations. The world at large is the market in which the authorities buy their provisions. It is bewildering to the layman, and impossible for him to understand the numerous engineering problems into which the work is divided. The rival schemes of high level, low level, and sea level, have been subjected to the criticism of the world’s most expert engineers for over a quarter of a century, and although the original plan of a sea level waterway was abandoned by De Lesseps, it is still held by many experts to be the only satisfactory one. The canal scheme that is at present proceeding is one of locks. The River Chagres, which rises in the surrounding hills, is subject to enormous floods, and in the rainy season great tracts of country on the Atlantic side of the isthmus are under water. Villages and workshops are swamped, the railway tracks swept away and disorganisation sets in. [Illustration: THE FIRST LABOUR CAMP, GATUM.]