Bottle, ca. 1833. Recovered from the sea by Lieut. Alexander Romney aboard
H.M.S Desperate, adrift in the North Atlantic off the coast of Greenland.  The
accidental discovery of this bottle,the only artifact surviving the destruction of
an ill-fated ship and crew (among those lost, we mustassume, was the anonymous
dealer in antiquities who penned the manuscript which the bottle contained) provided
the first physical evidence in support of what had been, to that point, merely an
inspired speculation advanced by the now-legendary John Cleves Symmes.  In the
present enlightened age it may be difficult to realize that at that time Symmes's
suggestion that the interior of the earth was hollow and habitable, and that
vast openings existed at both the northern and southern polar regions,was
derided by most savants.  The publication of the narrative contained in this bottle,
however, with its compelling description of the rushing currents and "vast precipice"
that claimed the lives of the brave writer and his bold companions, led to the fitting
out of the famous Pierce expedition, and eventually tothe historic moment when
observers aboard balloons launched from the American ship Washington
were able to definitely establish the existence of the vast southern cataract
whose existence Symmes had predicted, making possible our present colonization
of the great continent of Symmezonia which had remained hidden for so many
millenia within the hollow interior of our planet.  Provenance: Bequest of Romney
Trust.

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