The financial success of the Suez Canal has exceeded the wildest dreams of its promoters. The increase of tonnage that has passed through it has been extraordinary. So, also, has been the income and the net receipts of the company. The net tonnage that used the canal in 1870 was only 436,609 tons. Ten years later the tonnage had increased to 3,057,421 tons. In 1885 the tonnage had further increased to 6,335,752 tons, which was the greatest that had passed through in a single year up to that time. In the last-named year the shipping that used the canal was more than thirteen times as much as it had been fifteen years before. The income and working expenses of the Suez Canal have varied as follows, compared with the annual income:— ───────────┬──────────────┬───────────────┬───────────────────── │ │ │Percentage of Working Year. │ Income. │ Working │ Expenses on │ │ Expenses. │ Income. ───────────┼──────────────┼───────────────┼───────────────────── │ £ │ £ │ .. 1870 │ 754,532 │ 754,532 │ .. 1875 │ 1,233,785 │ 717,860 │ .. 1880 │ 1,672,836 │ 682,457 │ .. 1883 │ 2,740,933 │ 758,861 │ .. 1886 │ .. │ 754,567 │ .. ───────────┴──────────────┴───────────────┴───────────────────── The heaviest items on the expenditure side are the interest and charges on capital, the administrative charges, transit, navigation, and telegraph charges, and maintenance of plant and warehouses. The two latter items, with water supply, make up the working expenses, less administration, and they amount unitedly to less than 180,000_l._ a year, or about 7 per cent. on the total gross annual receipts. There is a not uncommon impression that the trade for the East is now carried on almost exclusively with steamships _viâ_ the Suez Canal. Those who are actually engaged in the shipping trade, of course, know differently, but it is not unimportant that the general public should also know the facts, and we have, therefore, taken some pains to ascertain them. ──────────────────┬─────────────┬──────────────┬────────────── │ Total. │ Steam Ships. │Sailing Ships. ├─────────────┼──────────────┼────────────── │ tons. │ tons. │ tons. Vessels entered │ 1,957,000 │ 1,112,000 │ 845,000 Do. cleared │ 3,099,000 │ 1,921,000 │ 1,178,000 ├─────────────┼──────────────┼────────────── Totals │ 5,056,000 │ 3,033,000 │ 2,023,000 ──────────────────┴─────────────┴──────────────┴──────────────