482 ANNUAL RECORD OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY. 



This has been stoutly contested by other writers, who in- 

 sist that the effect of so comparatively small a surface will 

 not be appreciable in this way, but that it will involve a 

 very beneficial change in the climate of North Africa, where- 

 by the regions adjacent to the new lake will experience a 

 succession of showers, by which they will become compara- 

 tively fertile. 



Professor Le Verrier, who takes the latter ground, refers to 

 the beneficial action of water in the little thread of the Suez 

 Canal, and infers from it what will be the result in the evap- 

 oration from a surface about one hundred and sixty miles 

 long and twenty-five to thirty broad. 



In further objection to the proposition, Mr. Houyvet re- 

 marks, in a communication to the French Academy, that it 

 will not be difficult to establish this sea; the problem will be 

 how to keep it up. Supposing, however, according to his 

 communication, the sea to be established by means of a ca- 

 nal, it will lose an enormous quantity of water by evaporation 

 every day, without the introduction of an equal volume of 

 fresh water. The water evaporated being replaced by a 

 supply coming through the canal, the whole body will soon 

 reach the maximum of saturation. The evaporation still 

 continuing, a deposit of salt will be formed, which in time 

 will fill up the w T hole space of the interior sea, and the salin- 

 ity of the water will be such that no animal life can be sus- 

 tained in it, and the ultimate result will be singly the accu- 

 mulation of an immense deposit of salt. 



The projectors are very strongly of the opinion, however, 

 that the presence of this water and its evaporation will pro- 

 duce copious rains, which will in large measure return into 

 the sea, and not only accomplish the object referred to, but 

 also convert what is now a sterile waste into a fertile coun- 

 try. 13 A, July 25, 1874, 98; and 6 B, July 13, 1874, 102. 



STEAM-PRESSURE INDICATORS. 



A most exhaustive experimental investigation, by Profess- 

 or Berndt, into the accuracy of the. indicator diagrams used 

 in connection with steam-engines, has been published at the 

 Chemnitz Industrial School. The want of accurate knowl- 

 edge on this subject seems to have justified Professor Berndt 

 in the thoroughness of his inquiry. 



