THE OCEAN AS THE WORLD'S 

 RESERVOIR OF HEALTH (Continued) 



NOWHEKE, perhaps, in the whole world is there to 

 be seen so pointed an instance of what the land is 

 bound to become when deprived of the best influences 

 of the ocean as in Asia. In the broadest part of the 

 great African continent, it is true, we have a striking 

 instance of what the land becomes when the sea 

 breezes cease to blow over it. The great desert of 

 Sahara, uninhabitable, inhospitable, has, no doubt, its 

 part to play in the great economy of Nature in that 

 the fierce heat of the sun, striking upon the un- 

 watered land, rarefies the air as in a vast oven, and 

 causes an indraught from the moist heavier air of the 

 ocean to redress the equilibrium, and thus assists the 

 beneficent circulation of the aerial currents. But long 

 ere those helpful breezes have reached the interior so 

 sorely in need of them, they have been deprived of 

 their moisture and their coolness, and consequently 

 this great area is, and will ever remain, barren unless, 

 indeed, the splendid dreams of some great schemers 

 should ever be realized, and by the cutting of a 

 huge canal, or series of canals, the ocean should be 

 conducted into this vast waste portion of the earth's 

 surface. 



What stupendous changes in the climate of the 

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