FISH BENEATH SAHARA DESERT.

Shannon News, 5 December 1924, Page 3

FISH BENEATH SAHARA DESERT.

All the fish in the world are not in the sea, according to Paris' advice which makes the startling announcement that there are fish 200 and 300 feet beneath the sands of the Sahara. That is the extraordinary discovery made by the experiments of sinking artesian wells at various points in the North African waste with a view to possible irrigation. Waters drawn from great depths were found to contain small crabs, fish, and shellfish, all alive. The discovery is proving an absolute puzzle, no theory so far seeming entirely satisfactory. It has been possible, usually to explain the presence of fish and shell-fish' in underground waters, says:, “Shipping and Engineering," by the fact that they were locked up during some primeval cataclysm. These fishes adapt them-' selves gradually to new conditions, but, living in darkness, are always blind entirely or possess special optical apparatus suitable to darkness. Those found underneath the Sahara : belong to a species inhabiting the lakes of Palestine. Shafts sunk during the past few years in the Sahara prove there are large sheets of water everywhere. Fish found now prompt the belief that there is a vast underground sea, densely Inhabited.