What is the author's tone in The Path Between the Seas by David McCullough?

David McCullough tells the objective story of the building of the Panama Canal with a sense of grand adventure and sublime awe at the accomplishment. He concentrates on the period 1870-1914, but looks backward and forward for perspective. He focuses on individuals, great and small, showing how life has prepared them for their part in creating The Path Between the Seas, how contemporaries evaluate them - including both kudos and complaints - and how they are succeeded by others as the gigantic task grinds forward. Often the participants, even at the top, have little idea what is happening to them, and often would have given up had they realized all that would be involved before success would come. McCullough pulls the reader into the project and the spirit of late-Victorian era admirably and in rich detail.