question of the type of canal, should be determined. Two factors in the situation made Wallace’s job the hardest. The Commission made its headquarters in Washington, 2000 miles or a week’s journey away from the job, and the American people, eager for action, were making the air resound with cries of “make the dirt fly!” In a sense Wallace’s position was not unlike that of Gen. McClellan in the opening months of the Civil War when the slogan of the northern press was “On to Richmond,” and no thought was given to the obstacles in the path, or the wisdom of preparing fully for the campaign before it was begun. There are many who hold today that if Wallace had been deaf to those who wanted to see the dirt fly, had taken the men off the work of excavation until the type of canal had been determined and all necessary housing and sanitation work had been completed, the results attained would have been better, and the strain which broke down this really capable engineer would have been averted. [Illustration: _Photo by Underwood & Underwood_ FRENCH COTTAGES ON THE WATER FRONT, CRISTOBAL] Red tape immeasurable wound about the Chief Engineer and all his assistants. Requisitions had to go to the Commission for approval and the Commission clung to Washington tenaciously, as all federal commissions do wherever the work they are commissioned to perform may be situated. During the Civil War days a story was current of a Major being examined for promotion to a colonelcy. “Now, Major,” asked an examiner, “we will consider, if you please, the case of a regiment just ordered into battle. What is the usual position of the colonel in such a case?” “On Pennsylvania Avenue, about Willard’s Hotel,” responded the Major bravely and truthfully. The officers who directed Wallace’s fighting force clung to Pennsylvania Avenue and its asphalt rather than abide with Avenidà Centrale and its mud. So too did succeeding commissions until Theodore Roosevelt, who had a personal penchant for being on the firing line, ordered that all members of the Commission should reside on the Isthmus. At that he had trouble enforcing the order except with the Army and Navy officers who made up five-sevenths of the Commission.