Excerpt from Historical Account of the Navigable Rivers, Canals, and Railways, of Great Britain: As a Reference to Nichols, Priestley and Walker's New Map of Inland Navigation, Derived From Original and Parliamentary Documents in the Possession of Joseph Priestley, Esq. In China, particularly in the eastern provinces of that immane empire, multitudes of canals are every where met with; most of which furnish undeniable evidence of their antiquity and of the skill of their original constructors. The Royal Canal which was completed in the year 980 and occupied the labour of thirty thou sand men for forty-three years, is a most stupendous monument of the enterprise, ingenuity and perseverance of the ancient Chinese. Its length of main line is upwards of eight hundred and twenty five miles, and innumerable collateral branches are cut from it in every direction. Upon the surface of this canal and its subsidiaries many thousand families live in vessels, which form their travelling habitations, and which they seldom quit from their birth till their decease. And some idea may be tbrmed of the traffic upon it, when it is stated that the Emperor alone has ten thousand ve-eh constantly employed upon the different parts of its line. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.