A GARDEN IN VENICE 



you may light the water, or what appears to be 

 the water, though of course it is the gas, and see 

 it blaze for many minutes at a time. But there 

 have been no real explosions, and the flow of 

 water has never ceased, though, singular to relate, 

 the yield varies with the tide. 



The rise and fall of the Venice tide is rarely 

 more than three feet. The chamber and the 

 vein which fills it are two hundred feet below 

 the surface. The water that flows along that 

 vein probably comes from the Euganean hills 

 twenty miles away. At least they are the nearest 

 high lands which would give the necessary fall 

 and spring. Unless it be that the lagoon water 

 unconsciously does the work unassisted by any 

 fall from the hills, and by its weight and pressure 

 on the stratum of earth which rests on the fresh 

 water two hundred feet below, forces that water 

 up the tube driven down to seek it. Whichever 

 it is, the additional weight of a high tide has a 

 marked effect on the well's yield. Is it not a 

 rum world we live in ? 



So sensitive again is this spring that at the 



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