The French government, in fact, accused de Lesseps and his company of fraud.

事实上，法国政府指控 de Lesseps 及其公司欺诈。

The proposal, or plan, by de Lesseps's company was not a very good one.

de Lesseps 公司提出的建议或计划不是很好。

De Lesseps had supervised construction of Egypt's Suez Canal, but his success made him overconfident.

De Lesseps 曾监督过埃及苏伊士运河的建设，但他的成功让他过于自信。

Nevertheless, a lot of people gave the company money to build this canal, and in 1881, de Lesseps's company began to build the canal.

尽管如此，还是有很多人给公司出钱修建了这条运河，1881年， de Lesseps的公司开始修建这条运河。

Signed in 1854 and 1856, a pair of concessions gave de Lesseps authority to establish the Suez Canal Company and finance it by selling shares to " capitalists of all nations."

1854 年和 1856 年签署的两份特许协议授权德·莱斯普斯建立苏伊士运河公司，并通过向 “各国资本家” 出售股份为其融资。

Interestingly, they had not started it; it was begun by a French man named Ferdinand de Lesseps  in 1880, but he could not finish it because he ran out of funding.

有趣的是，他们并没有开始这个项目；它是由一位名叫费迪南德·德·雷赛布 (Ferdinand de Lesseps) 的法国人于 1880 年开始的，但由于资金用完而无法完成。

But De Lesseps' company still owned the land on which the canal would be built. The United States would have to buy the land, as well as the rights to build the waterway.

但是，德莱塞普斯的公司仍然拥有修建运河的土地。美国将不得不购买土地，以及建造水路的权利。

A study was made to decide which would be a better place for the canal -- Panama or Nicaragua. Engineers said it would cost less to complete the canal De Lesseps had started twenty years earlier in Panama.

一项研究决定了哪个地方更适合修建这条运河，巴拿马还是尼加拉瓜。工程师们表示，20年前在巴拿马开凿这条莱塞普斯运河将花费更少。

Another group favored cutting the way through Panama after purchasing the rights of the old French company which, under the direction of De Lesseps, the hero of the Suez Canal, had made a costly failure some twenty years before.

在购买了这家老法国公司的权利后， 另一群人赞成通过巴拿马开辟道路， 这家老法国公司在苏伊士运河的英雄德勒塞普斯的领导下，大约在二十年前付出了惨重的代价。