Democratic Sentinel, Volume 18, Number 37, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 September 1894 — A Changing Sea. [ARTICLE]

A Changing Sea.

The Caspian Sea lies eighty-five feet below the level of tho Black Sea, and is the greatest body of water in the world lying below the sea level. It is remarkable not only for this fact but for the changes that have occurred in its level. About tho first century of our era, there is no doubt that the level of the sea stood eighty-five feet above its present horizon, and, of course spread over a vastly more extensive area than at present. The Russian Geological Society has printed a treatise, written by N. M. Philipof, on these remarkable'changes of level. Since the eirly part of the Christian era, a general and gradual decline of the le\el of the sea has taken piace. In the eighteenth century, however, there appear to have been a few periods when the level rose. From the beginning of the present century thore has been a fall, but since 1865, judging from recent observations, the level has been higher. Lieutenant Sokoloff, a naval officer, while working in the Caspian region from 1843 to i«4B, collected much information. Ho found that in the present century it had risen, causing great apprehension among the inhabitants of an inundation, and giving rise to the belief in periodical variation every thirteen years. Lerch, while in Baku, in 1734 and 1747, found submerged buildings which had stoed on dry land thirty years before, and he mentioned a saying of the Persians that the sea rose and fell alternately every thirty years. M. Bhilijo: has made a special study of the whole question. Inquiring into the causes of these changes of level, he finds a variety of influences at work, such as the wind driving the water towards certain coasts, temperature of the air causing in summer, evaporation and consequent fall i& level. Rivers, rain and earthquake© are also among the active agenciec causing fluctuations from month to month and from day to day.