THE TUNNEL AND A SHORT SEA ROUTE TO CANADA.
[To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPCCTATOR."] SIR,—I pointed out last October that the transinsular rail- way across Newfoundland, recently completed, makes it possible to cut in two the sea voyage between the Old World and the New, as the run from Galway to Green Bay could be made in three days ; and, therefore, that a tunnel between Ireland and Scotland would not only bind our Mother-country into one island, but link Britain and Canada more closely together. As a counter proposal, though it really is not so, Mr. F. E. Baines, sometime Inspector-General of Mails, advocates in the Spectator of October 15th a canal across Ireland for seagoing ships. Asking for a Government survey, he adds : "Less energetic than Principal Grant, I do not propose to execute, as he would, forty miles of a new railway 'in a few weeks.' " I sent this letter to Mr. R. G. Reid, who constructed the Newfoundland railway, and inquired whether I had been unduly "energetic." Here is his answer :—" It is an easy matter, when our men are organised, to build and complete one mile per day of railway. This we have often done for weeks in succession. We could, therefore, build the branch of railway referred to by you in forty days. The road-bed in America is different from that of a British rail- road, of which the writer in the Spectator possibly was thinking." Of course, there is no higher authority on this subject than Mr. Reid. May I add one word ? The political and commercial importance of the tunnel is so overwhelming, that a survey for it should be pressed on the Government at once. Many other things can afford to wait.—I am, Sir, &c.,
G. M. GRANT, Principal.
Queen's University, Kingston, Canada, January 10th.
[We entirely agree with Principal Grant (1) in greatly preferring the tunnel to any ship canal, (2) in earnestly desiring that the Government should undertake a survey of the tunnel ronte.—ED. Spectator.]
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