The French determined to improve the supply of water, and in this way increase the value of the country both to themselves and the Arabs. The first attempt was made at the oasis of Tuggurt, in 1856. The apparatus was taken there on camels’ backs, with a great deal of trouble, and finally set at work. After five weeks of labor the drill struck a water course under the gypsum, at a depth of about two hundred feet. An immense spring gushed out with such force that very little strength was required for removing the tools. It flowed about a thousand gallons a minute, and has been flowing at that rate ever since. The natives were wild with delight. They danced and sung, and made a great many manifestations of joy, not only on the occasion of opening the well, but for days and weeks afterwards. Ever since then, similar scenes have been enacted in other parts of the desert occupied by the French, whenever a well is opened. The culture of dates has been enormously extended by the planting of new groves wherever the wells are made, and both the natives and their conquerors have found the enterprise of mutual advantage. Sometimes the wells are salt or brackish, but the date palm does not mind any little trifle like that. Whether the water which is supplied to it is fresh or salt, hot or cold, does not seem to make any difference to the tree. It prospers and grows and produces fruit all the same. [Sidenote: INLAND LAKE IN THE DESERT.] A part of the desert is below the level of the Mediterranean, and some of the scientific men and others interested in the development of Algeria, have proposed to dig a canal from the sea, and allow this empty space to be filled. They would thus create an inland lake on which steamers could run, and which could furnish a vast supply of water to groves of palm trees along its shores. But the enterprise is not likely to be undertaken, for a variety of reasons. In the first place, the cost would be something enormous, and quite out of proportion to the result proposed. The cutting or canal would be more than a hundred miles long, and for quite a distance, forty or fifty feet deep. The distance which could be flooded is variously estimated from twenty to forty thousand square miles. Of course the land covered by the water would be of no use, and it includes many prosperous oases of date palms, which would have far more water than they need in order to bear fruits. To start with, there would thus be a heavy loss.