Morning journal and courier., 1883-04-26
SaurnaI ana Courier.
SINGLE COPIES THREE GENTS.
Thursday, April 26. 1883.
THE AFRICAN INLAND SEA.

THE AFRICAN INLAND SEA.
 De Lesseps is certainly lively old gen. tleman. He is now-in his seventy ninth year, and his great canal schemes not being enough to occupy his mind, he has gone to Africa with Q body of contractors to decide whether it is practicable to make the long talked of inland sea by leading the Mediter- ranean into the ''chotts'' (dry basius) found southeast of Tunis and Algeria.
 The originator of this project Is M. Rou- daire. The plan is to connect by canal about forty feet deep and one hundred and sixty-five feet wide the mouth of little stream emptying into the Gulf of Gabes, on the southwest coast of Tunis, with four depressions which lie in a right line from east to west about thirty miles south of the mountains of Aures, bordering on the Sahara. The depressions are named Feisj, Djerid, Rarsa and Melrir. Of these Rarsa, whose surface is nearly one hundred feet below the sea level, is on the south frontier of Tunis it's basin will be twice as long as Lake Geneva and will contain forty miIliards cubic metres of water Melrir, within the French territory on the south of Algeria, has fourteen times the surface of Lake Geneva and will contain one hundred and sixty mil lizards cubic metres of water. They are to form one lake. The physical advantages, as well as the practieability of the work, have been discussed again and again by the Academy of Sciences in Paris since the first presentation of M Roudafre's plan. A committee of dis tinguished members of the Academy to whom Roudaire's plan was referred reported that the existence of this large body of water south of the Aures must exercise a very fa- vorable influence upon countries now ster- ile, and open up the heart of Africa to Eu- ropean civilization. The specific physical advantage will be the amelioration of the climate and the soil by evaporation of the waters of the new sea. Arrested by the snow capped heights, these will be condensed into clouds and fruitful rains.
 Dr. Lesseps, says writer upon this sub- ject, expects to see the old cities, the ruins of which are here scattered, renew them selves around the now dry basins, within one of which the remains of an ancient galley have been found. Their renewal must de- pend on renewed fertility of soil and this upon a new supply of. water from evspora tion- The report made to the Academy esti- mates this as 39, 690, 900 cubic metres of wa ter day; quantity sufficient to cover the whole surface of Tunis and Algeria with half saturated layer of air about eighty feet in depth. Reasoning by analogy from the evaporation of the Bitter Lakes lying in the same latitude and having a like climate. Roudaire estimates the mean of the daily evaporation as the same with that of those lakes; his observations made in the chotts with the evaporometer of sPichs showed the double of this on the days of the sirocco. The sirocco, which now destroys vegetation in Algeria, fertilizes France by bringing to it the watery vapor absorbed in it's passage across the Mediterranean.
 At Gabes the staff of NJ. de Lesssps have examined the point selected for the future port of the canal and have named it after M. Roudaire. They have verified the borings which Roudaire made there in 1s78-79 and have reported that the soil is easy to dig and the bay is excellent. The moro serious work of the commission was to begin the 22d ult by caravan to the interior, with an escort of one hundred men. The civilized world will await news from the expedition with interest.