thy for the party of Mazzini, which
aimed to establish a Roman Republic.

It may be conjectured that the disappointment of De Lesseps at this
abrupt ending of his diplomatic career was not very great. He had
not been drawn to the profession by natural inclination, but had
inherited it, so to speak, from his father, as another man might
inherit the profession of law or medicine, or as the son of a
mechanic might inherit his father's trade. His ambition and tastes
both led him in a different direction; he would play a more active,
a more striking part in the affairs of his time.

During the period of his residence in Egypt, as consul for France,
he must often have heard the project of a canal across the Isthmus
of Suez discussed, since the course of events was every year making
the necessity of the undertaking more evident. As is well known, the
idea of such a canal was not a new one: Herodotus speaks of a canal
designed and partly excavated by Pharaoh Necho in the seventh
century before Christ, to connect the city of Bubastis, in the Delta
of the Nile, with the Red Sea. As planned, the canal was to be ten
feet deep with a width sufficient for two triremes to pass abreast,
and it was expected that the voyage would be accomplished in four
days. After the lives of 126,000 Egyptian workmen had been
sacrificed to the hardships of the undertaking, Herodotus says that
Necho, alarmed at the difficulties and expense, consulted the Oracle
as to what was best for him to do, and received the answer: "Thou
art working for barbarians." The Egyptians, like the Greeks,
considered all foreigners as barbarians, and the answer simply
reflected the sentiment of the people, or of their leaders, that
this vast expenditure of labor, time, and money would prove to be,
after all, as much for the benefit of foreigners as for themselves.
The Oracle gave a voice to national and political prejudices, such
as even in our own time are continually evoked to block the wheels
of great enterprises. Necho, we are told, heeded the warning of the
Oracle and abandoned the enterprise, but about one hundred years
later, in the time of Darius Hystaspes, work on the canal was
resumed and the undertaking was completed. From time to time we find
mention made of the canal by later authors, but about the end of the
eighth century of our era it was finally abandoned and left to be
blocked up by the sand.

The project was revived by Napoleon I. at the time of his E