The city in the sea

In June of last year, 1925, long after this book was finished, the Morning Post published an account of how an Arab fisherman off the Isle of Jerba had discovered a city under the sea, giving intimate details that might have been taken from my little town Hyalos--details vouched for by Count de Prohak and Sir Dennison Ross.

Five months later--November 1925--an American reader of "The City in the Sea," then appearing serially in the States, sent me the following cutting from a Hartford Paper:

"_Moscow, October 29._--Discovery of an ancient submerged city near Shikov, a sandy bank on the Caspian Sea, was made Wednesday by Alexis Atayeff, a captain in the Soviet mercantile fleet. Atayeff's ship, bound from Persia to Baku, accidentally changed its usual course, and while soundings were being made he noticed buildings on the sea floor. Atayeff asserts that under the bright sunshine he could distinguish streets and buildings of ancient Asiatic architecture. Archæologists believe the discovery reveals the lost city of Karadasheger, which is believed to have been submerged centuries ago by an earthquake."

I make no complaint at these two old cities, one from the Caspian, the other from the Mediterranean, presenting themselves like this to the public; the desire for the limelight is excusable and understandable in a way, but I think with some propriety they might have delayed their appearance. As matters stand, many readers of the Press might fancy they were first on the stage--this is not so. Hyalos was discovered by me long before these venerable antiquities thought fit to appear at the wings to be brought before the footlights by their producers, Sir Dennison Ross and Captain Atayeff.