326 Atlantis Once More . [June, 
of Iberia It is not needful to point out how these two 
passages contradict each other. 
The empire of Atlantis, as figured in a map opposite page 
294, seems to have been put together on the principle of 
eschewing “ scientific frontiers.” In Asia it included the 
coasts of India from the Ganges westwards, the coasts of 
Arabia and Persia, the whole of Asiatic Turkey, and the 
regions around the Caspian and the Sea of Aral, extending 
eastwards nearly to the frontiers of China proper, but 
leaving Thibet, much of Affghanistan, and Northern India 
untouched. In Europe the Atlanteans held the coasts of 
the Mediterranean, the whole of Spain, Italy, and Greece, 
much of Austria and Switzerland, the South of Russia, the 
coasts of France, the shores of the Baltic, the southern half 
of Sweden and Norway, and the British Islands. There 
remained unconquered a wedge of land narrow in the centre 
of France, and getting broader through Germany, Poland, 
and North Russia. In Africa they held the Valley of the 
Nile, the shores of the Red Sea, the Mediterranean, and the 
Atlantic down nearly to the Gold Coast. In America their 
dominions were strangely grouped. Neglecting the very 
.near and accessible Atlantic coast and the West Indian 
Islands, they occupied the whole of Central America and 
Mexico, the Valley of the Mississippi and its affluents, the 
southern shore of the Canadian lakes, and a line of country 
leading over the Rocky Mountains to British Columbia. In 
South America they avoided the entire northern and eastern 
coasts, but passing up the Amazon they overran the whole 
of its valley, and crossing over the Andes settled in Peru, 
Bolivia, and Chili ! Never surely was a vast empire formed 
with such disregard of accessibility, desirability, and defence. 
Mr. Donnelly says that they avoided the “ fever-stricken low- 
lands of Brazil.” But, on his showing, they settled on the 
more fever-stricken coasts of West Africa, and in the tierras 
calientes of Mexico 1 
Of these colonies Egypt is said to be the oldest, and 
hence to have acquired most of the civilisation of the 
mother country. This is, in itself, -exceedingly improbable. 
The first attempts of any country in colonisation are gene- 
rally made in the nearest available places. The Greeks 
colonised Southern Italy ; the Tyrians, Northern Africa ; 
the Carthaginians, Spain ; &c. Had the Atlanteans pro- 
ceeded on this natural principle their earliest settlements 
would have sprung up in Spain, Portugal, and Morocco. 
But Mr. Donnelly could not shut his eyes to the manifest 
truth that in the basin of the Mediterranean civilisation has 
