Without urging further the grounds of my opinion, I repeat, in conclusion, that it is the right and the duty of the United States to assert and maintain such supervision and authority over any interoceanic canal across the isthmus that connects North and South America as will protect our national interests. This, I am quite sure, will be found not only compatible with, but promotive of, the widest and most permanent advantage to commerce and civilization. The reader will see that all this is inconsistent with the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty, under which the United States had actually undertaken to claim no such exclusive control as was now desired. Lengthy negotiations were now set on foot with England for the abrogation of a treaty which forbade the United States to build a canal of their own and prevented them from effectually opposing the French scheme. Lord Granville, however, saw no reason why England should abandon the treaty solely in the interests of the United States, and the negotiations were fruitless. Meantime the French persisted in their undertaking. Their canal was to be tide-level, twenty-eight feet deep, costing L26,400,000. A corporation entitled the Compagnie Universelle du Canal Interoceanique de Panama was formed in 1881, and in the same year the work of construction was begun. So it looked as though the Americans were to lose all chance of constructing an isthmian canal under their own control. Events, however, were to decide otherwise. CHAPTER IV. THE FRENCH FAILURE.