22 FEBRUARY 1902, Page 16

[TO THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR.")

Sin,—You may perhaps consider the following passage from Marlowe's Tamburlaine the Great (Part II., Act T., Scene 3) worth quoting as an instance in which a dramatist has "anticipated the triumphs of later science" :— "And here, not far from Alexandria,

Whereat the Tyrrhene and the Red Sea meet, Being distant less than full a hundred leagues, I meant to cat a channel to them both, That men might quickly sail to India."