The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1881-05-23
THF, PRESS.
The River lethe.
Suggestion that Lieutenant Gorringe
Has Found the Famous Stream.


IN. Y Tmes.]
Those who recall the fascination exercised
over their youthful minds by the myth of the
River Lethe, whose waters gave forgetfulness
OF woe and sorrow will not, perhaps, thank
Lieutenant Commander Gorringe for trans
forming beautiful fable into prosaic reality
by locating the tabled stream and taking the
temperature of the water, as he has done in
paper preserved in the records of the Ameri-
can geographical society. On the north coast
OF Africa, constructed of the magnificent ruins
of a preceding civilization, stands the nonde-
script Arab town of Bengliazi for whose erec-
ton the columns and sculptures of the ancient
city of Bernice have been anonymously ap-
propriated. Here, in the midst of Arab squalor
one chances upon a block of marble covered
with Greek or Latin inscriptions; yonder the
re mains OF a magnificent capital or scnlp-
tured cornice is built into the wall upside
down. In the vicinity of this nondescript
city the ground is broken by precipitous fis-
assures so or 60 feet deep, whose walls are Of
ten nearly perpendicular, and whose bottom
consists of crcumscrbed surfaces of iuxuriant
vegetation, contrasting strangely, almost
weirdly with the arid desert These bottoms
are believed to be all that time has left of a
once beautiful region celebrated in some an
Gent story as the gardens of the HeSperides.
In one of them, about seven miles from Benga-
liaZi, is the entrance 20 extensive cavern
hose passages lead to large sheet of water,
clear and pure as crystal, which is believed to-
be identical with the River Lethe of mytholo-
gy. Commander Gorringe transported boat
across the desert on the backs of two donkeys,
and bad the pleasure of an afternoon row on
the surface of this famous subterranean stream
which appears to draw its supply from deep
seated springs, and runs through series of
underground caves, high-roofei and roomy,
which are connected by narrow passages. The
current is sensible one, showing that the
sheet must possess an outlet, and walls of the
successive caverns traversed by it are in part,
at least, says Commander Gorringe artificial
in their structure. They are engraved with
inscriptions, some of which are believed to be
Punic, but which no explorer has yet under
taken to copy and translate. Commander
Gorringe proposes somewhat striking and
original explanation of the celebrity of the
Lethe and the origin of the fable. In the
spring there prevails on this section of the
coast of Africa, an air blast, which rises from
the arid desert to the south, and is unendurbly
hot and dry, besides being laden with binding
and noxious insects. The temperature in the
shade during the prevalence of these winds
rises to 131 degrees Fahrenheit, and when
Commander Gorringe bathed his head in salt
water to alay the discomfort caused by muscu-
lar exertion, the moisture was evaporated so
rapidly that his hair and face were covered with
coating of solid salt almost instantaneously.
Commander Gorringe's theory is that the
Lethe was an artiicially elaborated subterra-
mean retreat for the people of Berenice from
the desert winds (gibbhS) of the spring season.
The temperature of the cavern he found TO be
about 65 degrees Fahrenheit, and that of the
stream about 30 degrees. 1t requires some
tension of the imagination to refer the ex-
travagant poetical myths of the Lethe to
M mosaic. hur rbop i,
summer resort and the myths were tours de
force of ancient advertising.