Atlantis Once More. 
321 
1883.] 
In this section we find certain further misapprehensions. 
Mr. Donnelly writes : — “ There can be no question that the 
Australian Archipelago is simply the mountain-tops of a 
drowned continent which once reached from India to South 
America. Science has gone so far as even to give it a name ; 
it is called Lemuria.” Now the hypothetical Lemuria was 
supposed to lie not in the Pacific, but in the Indian Ocean, 
extending from Madagascar to Ceylon, or perhaps Sumatra. 
The supposition of a continent reaching from India to the 
Peruvian coasts is exceedingly questionable. 
Mr. Donnelly gives his opinion that “ the Desert of Sahara 
was once under water, and its now burning sands are a de- 
posit of the sea.” This view is now, we may say, exploded. 
Dr. Lenz has found in the Desert fresh-water fossils, and its 
sands are considered to have been formed by the disintegra- 
tion of the rocks, long exposed to intense heat by day, to a 
comparatively low temperature at night, whilst unprotected 
by vegetation. 
We come now to the second part of the author’s argu- 
ment, where he seeks to show that there is nothing impossible 
or improbable in the sudden disappearance of an island like 
Atlantis. The convulsions and eruptions which he cites do 
not make even a remote approach. The most extensive is 
the subsidence of the fort and village of Sindree, on the 
eastern arm of the Indus, caused by an earthquake in 1819. 
This traCt is 2000 square miles in extent. Now Mr. Don- 
nelly gives the island of Atlantis a breadth of 1000 miles by 
a length of 2000 to 3000 miles. Hence its area would be 
from two to three million square miles ! It is safe to say 
that we have no catastrophe on record which approaches 
even from afar the sudden disappearance of such a region. 
Further, the land about the mouths of the Indus is of ex- 
ceedingly unstable character. The branches of the river 
often change their position to such a degree as seriously to 
interfere with engineering operations. Atlantis, on the other 
hand, is described as rocky and mountainous, not a stretch 
of alluvial sands and muds, such as are generally found in 
the deltas of large rivers. 
We must therefore conclude that the sudden overthrow of 
Atlantis, if not impossible — a word which scientific men are 
not fond of using — is highly improbable. As far as this part 
of the subject is concerned we must return a verdict of “not 
proven.” 
We turn now to what the author entitles the “ Testimony 
of the Sea.” He lays great stress on the so-called 
“ Dolphin ” and “ Challenger” ridges, the former of which 
