There may be good reason why the delay incident to the adoption of a plan for an ideal canal should be incurred; but if there is not, then I hope to see the canal constructed on a system which will bring to the nearest possible date in the future the time when it is practicable to take the first ship across the Isthmus--that is, which will in the shortest time possible secure a Panama waterway between the oceans of such a character as to guarantee permanent and ample communication for the greatest ships of our Navy and for the largest steamers on either the Atlantic or the Pacific. The delay in transit of the vessels owing to additional locks would be of small consequence when compared with shortening the time for the construction of the canal or diminishing the risks in the construction. In short, I desire your best judgment on all the various questions to be considered in choosing among the various plans for a comparatively high-level multilock canal, for a lower-level canal with fewer locks, and for a sea-level canal. Finally, I urge upon you the necessity of as great expedition in coming to a decision as is compatible with thoroughness in considering the conditions. The Board organized and met in the city of Washington on September 1, 1905, and on the 10th of January, 1906, or about four months later, made its final report to the President through the Secretary of War. The Board divided upon the question of type for the proposed canal, a majority of eight--five foreign engineers and three American engineers--being in favor of a canal at sea-level, while a minority of five--all American engineers--favored a lock canal at a summit level of eighty-five feet. The two propositions require separate consideration, each upon its own merits, before a final opinion can be arrived at as to the best type of a waterway adapted to our needs and requirements under existing conditions. Upon a question so involved and complex, where the most eminent engineers divide and disagree, a layman can not be expected to view the problem otherwise than as a business proposition which, demanding solution, must be disposed of by a strictly impartial examination of the facts. Weighed and tested by practical experience in other fields of commercial enterprise, it is probably not going too far to say, as in fact it has been said, that there is entirely too much mere engineering opinion upon this subject and not a well-defined concentrated mass of data and solid convictions. It is equally true, and should be kept in mind, that the time given by the Board to the consideration of the subject in all its practical bearings, including an examination of actual conditions on the Isthmus, was limited to so short a period that it would be contrary to all human experience that this report should represent an infallible or final verdict for or against either of the two propositions.