The Great Islands Under The Sea

THE GREAT ISLANDS UNDER THE SEA continued

When the barriers of Atlantis sank sufficiently to permit the natural expanSion
of the heated water of the tropics to the north, the ice and snow which cover-
ed Europe gradually disappeared: the Gulf Stream flowed around Atlantis and it
still retains the circular motion first imparted to it by the presence of that
island.

The officers of the CHALLENGER found the entire ridge of Atlantis covered with
volcanic deposits; these are the subsided mud which, as Plato tells us, rendered
the sea impassable after the destruction of the island.

The United States ship GETTYSBURG has also made some remarkable discoveries
in a neighboring fiels.

'......The recently announced discovery by Commander Gorringe, of the United States
sloop GETTYSBURG, of a bank of soundings bearing 85 degrees W, and distant 130
miles from Cape St. Vincent, during the last voyage of the vessel across the Atlantic,
taken in connection with previous soundings obtained in the same region of the North
Atlantic, suggests the probable existence of a submarine ridge or plateau connecting
the island of madeira with the coast of PortugaL, and the probable subaerial connection
in prehistoric times of that island with the southwestern extremity of Europe......"

A member of the CHALLENGER staff, soon after the termination of the expediton, gave
it as his opinion that the great submarine plateau is the remains of

"........the lost Atlantis."