an area is calculated to intercept would be insufficient of itself to account for the extraordinary abundance of fresh water daily drawn from the wells. For instance, the superficial extent of each of the Laccadives is but two or three square miles, the surface soil resting on a crust of coral, beneath which is a stratum of sand; and yet on reaching the latter, fresh water flows in such profusion, that wells and large tanks for soaking coco-nut fibre are formed in any place by merely "breaking through the crust and taking out the sand."--_Madras Journal_, vol. xiv. It is curious that the abundant supply of water in these wells should have attracted the attention of the early navigators, and Cosmas Indicoplenstes, writing in the sixth century, speaks of the numerous small islands off the coast of Taprobane, with abundance of fresh water and coco-nut palms, although these islands rest on a bed of sand. (_Cosmas Ind_. ed. Thevenot, vol. i. p. 3, 20). It is remarkable that in the little island of Ramisseram, one of the chain which connects Adam's Bridge with the Indian continent, fresh water is found freely on sinking for it in the sand. But this is not the case in the adjacent island of Manaar, which participates in the geologic character of the interior of Ceylon. The fresh water in the Laccadive wells always fluctuates with the rise and fall of the tides. In some rare instances, as on the little island of Bitra, which is the smallest inhabited spot in the group, the water, though abundant, is brackish, but this is susceptible of an explanation quite consistent with the experiments of Mr. Witt, which require that the process of percolation shall be continued "during _long_ periods and through _great masses of porous strata_;" Darwin equally concedes that to keep the rain fresh when banked in, as he assumes, by the sea, the mass of madrepore must be "sufficiently thick to prevent mechanical admixture; and where the land consists of loose blocks of coral with open interstices, the water, if a well be dug, is brackish." Conditions analogous to all these particularised, present themselves at Jaffna, and seem to indicate that the extent to which fresh water is found there, is directly connected with percolation from the sea. The quantity of rain which annually falls is less than in England, being but thirty inches; whilst the average heat is highest in Ceylon, and the evaporation great in proportion. Throughout the peninsula, I am informed by Mr. Byrne, the Government surveyor of the district, that as a general rule "_all the wells are below the sea level_." It would be useless to sink them in the higher ground, where they could only catch surface water. The November rains fill them at once to the brim, but the water quickly subsides as the season becomes dry, and "_sinks to the uniform level, at which it remains fixed for the next nine or ten months_, unless when slightly affected by showers."