3. The right to charge landowners for the use of the water of the fresh-water canal, which, on the other hand, it was bound to supply.
4. All mines found on the company’s lands, and the right to extract from all State mines and quarries, free of cost, royalty, or tax, the stone, plaster, or other materials required for the construction of the canal and ports.
It was provided that the canal and works were to be finished, save for unavoidable delays, within six years. Native labour was to be employed to the extent of four-fifths of the whole, a special convention settling the terms on which the Government supplied or authorised such labour. The tolls were fixed at 10 frs. per “ton of capacity” (an expression which gave rise to difficulties subsequently), and 10 frs. for each passenger.
A contract was made with M. Hardon for the execution of the works, under which the company were to receive 60 per cent. of the prices fixed by the original estimates of the International Commission. The drawing up of the plans, the general superintendence, and the supply of the machinery and stores, were, however, to be left in the hands of the company. This agreement was subsequently cancelled, and the company took the works under its own control, making contracts with four different firms, who undertook to complete the principal undertakings for a total sum of 4,588,800_l._[148] With these arrangements, the canal was fairly launched. From 1861 till 1869 the whole line of the canal was the busiest centre of industrial activity in Europe. The total amount of excavation required was 107 millions of cubic metres. This is a larger amount of digging than has been accomplished in the case of any other work on record.[149] The operations were required to be carried on at the same time with the fresh-water canal from Nefiche to Suez, and with the maritime canal from Suez to Port Said, so that two distinct undertakings were concurrently being constructed. Some details as to the annual progress of the works may here be suitably introduced.
In 1861, the works were chiefly confined to digging wells along the line of the maritime canal, to erecting sheds for 10,000 labourers, and providing dock basins, water condensers, forges and workshops, steam saw-mills, and opening a water supply by a canal which should join the Nile to Lake Timsah.