high, while the Styx, another river, is 450 feet long, from 15 to 40
feet wide, and from 30 to 40 feet deep, and is spanned by a natural
bridge. Lake Lethe has about the same length and width as the river
Styx, varies in depth from 3 to 40 feet, lies beneath a ceiling some
90 feet above its surface, and sometimes rises to a height of 60 feet.
There is also a Dead Sea, quite a somber body of water. There are
several interesting caves in the neighborhood, one three miles long
and three each about a mile in length.


THE SOUTH SEA BUBBLE.--The "South Sea Bubble," as it is generally
called, was a financial scheme which occupied the attention of
prominent politicians, communities, and even nations in the early
part of the eighteenth century. Briefly the facts are: In 1711 Robert
Hartley, Earl of Oxford, then Lord Treasurer, proposed to fund a
floating debt of about £10,000,000 sterling, the interest, about
$600,000, to be secured by rendering permanent the duties upon wines,
tobacco, wrought silks, etc. Purchasers of this fund were to become
also shareholders in the "South Sea Company," a corporation to have
the monopoly of the trade with Spanish South America, a part of the
capital stock of which was to be the new fund. But Spain, after the
treaty of Utrecht, refused to open her commerce to England, and the
privileges of the "South Sea Company" became worthless. There were
many men of wealth who were stockholders, and the company continued
to flourish, while the ill success of its trading operations was
concealed. Even the Spanish War of 1718 did not shake the popular
confidence. Then in April, 1720, Parliament, by large majorities in
both Houses, accepted the company's plan for paying the national debt,
and after that a frenzy of speculation seized the nation, and the
stock rose to £300 a share, and by August had reached £1,000 a share.