59 o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



explore the Dead Sea. Under ordinary circumstances the pro- 

 posal would doubtless have been strangled with red tape ; but 

 fortunately the Secretary at that time was Mr. John Y. Mason, of 

 Virginia. Mr. Mason was famous for his good nature : both at 

 Washington and at Paris, where he was afterward minister, this 

 predominant trait has left a multitude of amusing traditions ; it 

 was of him that Thomas Benton said, " To be supremely happy he 

 must have his paunch full of oysters and his hands full of cards." 



The Secretary granted permission, but evidently gave the 

 matter not another thought. As a result, came an expedition the 

 most comical and one of the most rich in results to be found 

 in American annals. Never was anything so happy-go-lucky. 

 Lieutenant Lynch started with his hulk, with hardly an instru- 

 ment save those ordinarily found on shipboard, and with a body 

 of men probably the most unfit for anything like scientific inves- 

 tigation ever sent on such an errand ; fortunately, he picked up a 

 young instructor in mathematics, Mr. Anderson, and added to 

 his apparatus two strong iron boats. 



Arriving, after a tedious voyage, on the coast of Asia Minor, 

 he set at work. He had no adequate preparation in general his- 

 tory, archseology, or the physical sciences, but he had his Ameri- 

 can patriotism, energy, pluck, pride, and devotion to duty, and 

 these qualities stood him in good stead. With great labor he got 

 the iron boats across the country. Then the tug of war began. 

 First of all investigators, he forced his way through the whole 

 length of the river Jordan and from end to end of the Dead Sea. 

 There were constant difficulties, geographical, climatic, and per- 

 sonal, but Lynch cut through them all. He was brave or shrewd, 

 as there was need. Anderson proved an admirable helper, and 

 together they made surveys of distances, altitudes, depths, and 

 sundry simple investigations in a geological, mineralogical, and 

 chemical way. Much was poorly done, much was left undone, 

 but the general result was most honorable both to Lynch and 

 Anderson, and Secretary Mason found that his easy-going patron- 

 age of the enterprise was the best act of his official life. 



The results of this expedition on public opinion were most 

 curious. Lynch was no scholar in any sense; he had traveled 

 little, and thought less on the real questions underlying the 

 whole investigation ; as to the difference in depth of the two parts 

 of the lake, he jumped with a sailor's disregard of logic to the 

 conclusion that it somehow proved the mythical account of the 

 overwhelming of the cities, and he indulges in reflections of a 

 sort probably suggested by his recollections of American Sunday 

 schools. 



Especially noteworthy is his treatment of the legend of Lot's 

 wife. He found the pillar of salt. It happened to be at that 



