536 
SUBTERRANEAN WATERS OF GREECE. 
courses of tlie Karst are without visible outlet, and, in some 
instances at least, they, no doubt, send their waters, by deep 
channels, to the Adriatic.* The city of Trieste is very insuffi¬ 
ciently provided with fresh water. It has been thought prac¬ 
ticable to supply this want by tunnelling through the wall of 
the plateau, which rises abruptly in the rear of the town, until 
some subterranean stream is encountered, the current of which 
can be conducted to the city. More visionary projectors have 
gone further, and imagined that advantage might be taken of 
the natural tunnels under the Karst for the passage of roads, 
railways, and even navigable canals. But however chimerical 
these latter schemes may seem, there is every reason to believe 
that art might avail itself of these galleries for improving the 
imperfect drainage of the champaign country bounded by the 
Karst, and that stopping or opening the natural channels 
might very much modify the hydrography of an extensive 
region. 
Subterranean Waters of Greece. 
There are parts of continental Greece which resemble the 
Karst and the adjacent plains in being provided with a natural 
subterranean drainage. The superfluous waters run off into 
limestone caves called catavothra ( KaraftoOpa ). In ancient 
times, the entrances to the catavothra were enlarged or par¬ 
tially closed as the convenience of drainage or irrigation re¬ 
quired, and there is no doubt that similar measures might be 
adopted at the present day with great advantage both to the 
salubrity and the productiveness of the regions so drained. 
* The Recca, a river with a considerable current, has been satisfactorily 
identified with a stream flowing through the cave of Trebich, and with the 
Timavo—the Timavus of Yirgil and the ancient geographers—which empties 
through several mouths into the Adriatic between Trieste and Aquileia. 
The distance from Trieste to a suitable point in the grotto of Trebich is 
thought to be less than three miles, and the difficulties in the way of con¬ 
structing a tunnel do not seem formidable. The works of Schmidl, Die 
JEfoJilen des Karstes , and Der unterirdische Lauf der Recca, are not common 
out of Germany, but the reader will find many interesting facts derived 
from them in two articles entitled Der unterirdische Lauf der Recca , in 
Aus der Natur , xx , pp. 250-254, 263-266. 
