Part 8 (1/2)
ISLANDS SOUTH OF THE SANDWICH ARCHIPELAGO.
CHRISTMAS Island (2 deg N., 157 deg W.). Captain Cook, in his ”Third Voyage” (Volume ii., chapter x.), has given a detailed account of this atoll. The breadth of the islets on the reef is unusually great, and the sea near it does not deepen so suddenly as is generally the case. It has more lately been visited by Mr. F.D. Bennett (”Geographical Journal,”
volume vii., page 226); and he a.s.sures me that it is low and of coral-formation: I particularly mention this, because it is engraved with a capital letter, signifying a high island, in D'Urville and Lottin's chart.
Mr. Couthouy, also, has given some account of it (”Remarks,” page 46) from the Hawaiian ”Spectator”; he believes it has lately undergone a small elevation, but his evidence does not appear to me satisfactory; the deepest part of the lagoon is said to be only ten feet; nevertheless, I have coloured it blue.--FANNING Island (4 deg N., 158 deg W.) according to Captain Tromelin (”Ann. Maritim.” 1829, page 283), is an atoll: his account as observed by Krusenstern, differs from that given in Fanning's ”Voyage” (page 224), which, however, is far from clear; coloured blue.-- WAs.h.i.+NGTON Island (4 deg N., 159 deg W.) is engraved as a low island in D'Urville's chart, but is described by Fanning (page 226) as having a much greater elevation than Fanning Island, and hence I presume it is not an atoll; not coloured.--PALMYRA Island (6 deg N., 162 deg W.) is an atoll divided into two parts (Krusenstern's ”Mem. Suppl.” page 50, also Fanning's ”Voyage,” page 233); blue.--SMYTH'S or Johnston's Islands (17 deg N., 170 deg W.). Captain Smyth, R.N., has had the kindness to inform me that they consist of two very low, small islands, with a dangerous reef off the east end of them. Captain Smyth does not recollect whether these islets, together with the reef, surrounded a lagoon; uncoloured.
SANDWICH ARCHIPELAGO.
HAWAII; in the chart in Freycinet's ”Atlas,” small portions of the coast are fringed by reefs; and in the accompanying ”Hydrog. Memoir,” reefs are mentioned in several places, and the coral is said to injure the cables.
On one side of the islet of Kohaihai there is a bank of sand and coral with five feet water on it, running parallel to the sh.o.r.e, and leaving a channel of about fifteen feet deep within. I have coloured this island red, but it is very much less perfectly fringed than others of the group.--MAUI; in Freycinet's chart of the anchorage of Raheina, two or three miles of coast are seen to be fringed; and in the ”Hydrog. Memoir,” ”banks of coral along sh.o.r.e” are spoken of. Mr. F.D. Bennett informs me that the reefs, on an average, extend about a quarter of a mile from the beach; the land is not very steep, and outside the reefs the sea does not become deep very suddenly; coloured red.--MOROTOI, I presume, is fringed: Freycinet speaks of the breakers extending along the sh.o.r.e at a little distance from it.
From the chart, I believe it is fringed; coloured red.--OAHU; Freycinet, in his ”Hydrog. Memoir,” mentions some of the reefs. Mr. F.D. Bennett informs me that the sh.o.r.e is skirted for forty or fifty miles in length. There is even a harbour for s.h.i.+ps formed by the reefs, but it is at the mouth of a valley; red.--ATOOI, in La Peyrouse's charts, is represented as fringed by a reef, in the same manner as Oahu and Morotoi; and this, as I have been informed by Mr. Ellis, on part at least of the sh.o.r.e, is of coral-formation: the reef does not leave a deep channel within; red.--ONEEHOW; Mr. Ellis believes that this island is also fringed by a coral-reef: considering its close proximity to the other islands, I have ventured to colour it red. I have in vain consulted the works of Cook, Vancouver, La Peyrouse, and Lisiansky, for any satisfactory account of the small islands and reefs, which lie scattered in a N.W. line prolonged from the Sandwich group, and hence have left them uncoloured, with one exception; for I am indebted to Mr. F.D. Bennett for informing me of an atoll-formed reef, in lat.i.tude 28 deg 22', longitude 178 deg 30' W., on which the ”Gledstanes”
was wrecked in 1837. It is apparently of large size, and extends in a N.W.
and S.E. line: very few islets have been formed on it. The lagoon seems to be shallow; at least, the deepest part which was surveyed was only three fathoms. Mr. Couthouy (”Remarks,” page 38) describes this island under the name of OCEAN island. Considerable doubts should be entertained regarding the nature of a reef of this kind, with a very shallow lagoon, and standing far from any other atoll, on account of the possibility of a crater or flat bank of rock lying at the proper depth beneath the surface of the water, thus affording a foundation for a ring-formed coral-reef. I have, however, thought myself compelled, from its large size and symmetrical outline, to colour it blue.
SAMOA OR NAVIGATOR GROUP.
Kotzebue, in his ”Second Voyage,” contrasts the structure of these islands with many others in the Pacific, in not being furnished with harbours for s.h.i.+ps, formed by distant coral-reefs. The Rev. J. Williams, however, informs me, that coral-reefs do occur in irregular patches on the sh.o.r.es of these islands; but that they do not form a continuous band, as round Mangaia, and other such perfect cases of fringed islands. From the charts accompanying La Peyrouse's ”Voyage,” it appears that the north sh.o.r.e of SAVAII, MAOUNA, OROSENGA, and MANUA, are fringed by reefs. La Peyrouse, speaking of Maouna (page 126), says that the coral-reef surrounding its sh.o.r.es, almost touches the beach; and is breached in front of the little coves and streams, forming pa.s.sages for canoes, and probably even for boats. Further on (page 159), he extends the same observation to all the islands which he visited. Mr. Williams in his ”Narrative,” speaks of a reef going round a small island attached to OYOLAVA, and returning again to it: all these islands have been coloured red.--A chart of ROSE Island, at the extreme west end of the group, is given by Freycinet, from which I should have thought that it had been an atoll; but according to Mr.
Couthouy (”Remarks,” page 43), it consists of a reef, only a league in circuit, surmounted by a very few low islets; the lagoon is very shallow, and is strewed with numerous large boulders of volcanic rock. This island, therefore, probably consists of a bank of rock, a few feet submerged, with the outer margin of its upper surface fringed with reefs; hence it cannot be properly cla.s.sed with atolls, in which the foundations are always supposed to lie at a depth, greater than that at which the reef-constructing polypifers can live; not coloured.
BEVERIDGE Reef, 20 deg S., 167 deg W., is described in the ”Naut. Mag.”
(May 1833, page 442) as ten miles long in a N. and S. line, and eight wide; ”in the inside of the reef there appears deep water;” there is a pa.s.sage near the S.W. corner: this therefore seems to be a submerged atoll, and is coloured blue.
SAVAGE Island, 19 deg S., 170 deg W., has been described by Cook and Forster. The younger Forster (volume ii., page 163) says it is about forty feet high: he suspects that it contains a low plain, which formerly was the lagoon. The Rev. J. Williams informs me that the reef fringing its sh.o.r.es, resembles that round Mangaia; coloured red.
FRIENDLY ARCHIPELAGO.
PYLSTAART Island. Judging from the chart in Freycinet's ”Atlas,” I should have supposed that it had been regularly fringed; but as nothing is said in the ”Hydrog. Memoir” (or in the ”Voyage” of Tasman, the discoverer) about coral-reefs, I have left it uncoloured.--TONGATABOU: In the ”Atlas of the Voyage of the 'Astrolabe',” the whole south side of the island is represented as narrowly fringed by the same reef which forms an extensive platform on the northern side. The origin of this latter reef, which might have been mistaken for a barrier-reef, has already been attempted to be explained, when giving the proofs of the recent elevation of this island.-- In Cook's charts the little outlying island also of EOAIGEE, is represented as fringed; coloured red.--EOUA. I cannot make out from Captain Cook's charts and descriptions, that this island has any reef, although the bottom of the neighbouring sea seems to be corally, and the island itself is formed of coral-rock. Forster, however, distinctly (”Observations,” page 14) cla.s.ses it with high islands having reefs, but it certainly is not encircled by a barrier-reef and the younger Forster (”Voyage,” volume i., page 426) says, that ”a bed of coral-rocks surrounded the coast towards the landing-place.” I have therefore cla.s.sed it with the fringed islands and coloured it red. The several islands lying N.W. of Tongatabou, namely ANAMOUKA, KOMANGO, KOTOU, LEFOUGA, FOA, etc., are seen in Captain Cook's chart to be fringed by reefs, in several of them are connected together.
From the various statements in the first volume of Cook's ”Third Voyage,”
and especially in the fourth and sixth chapters, it appears that these reefs are of coral-formation, and certainly do not belong to the barrier cla.s.s; coloured red.--TOUFOA AND KAO, forming the western part of the group, according to Forster have no reefs; the former is an active volcano.--VAVAO. There is a chart of this singularly formed island, by Espinoza: according to Mr. Williams it consists of coral-rock: the Chevalier Dillon informs me that it is not fringed; not coloured. Nor are the islands of LATTE and AMARGURA, for I have not seen plans on a large scale of them, and do not know whether they are fringed.
NIOUHA, 16 deg S., 174 deg W., or KEPPEL Island of Wallis, or COCOS Island.
From a view and chart of this island given in Wallis's ”Voyage” (4to edition) it is evidently encircled by a reef; coloured blue: it is however remarkable that BOSCAWEN Island, immediately adjoining, has no reef of any kind; uncoloured.
WALLIS Island, 13 deg S., 176 deg W., a chart and view of this island in Wallis's ”Voyage” (4to edition) shows that it is encircled. A view of it in the ”Naut. Mag.” July 1833, page 376, shows the same fact; blue.
ALLOUFATOU, or HORN Island, ONOUAFU, or PROBY Island, and HUNTER Islands, lie between the Navigator and Fidji groups. I can find no distinct accounts of them.
FIDJI or VITI GROUP.
The best chart of the numerous islands of this group, will be found in the ”Atlas of the 'Astrolabe's' Voyage.” From this, and from the description given in the ”Hydrog. Memoir,” accompanying it, it appears that many of these islands are bold and mountainous, rising to the height of between 3,000 and 4,000 feet. Most of the islands are surrounded by reefs, lying far from the land, and outside of which the ocean appears very deep. The ”Astrolabe” sounded with ninety fathoms in several places about a mile from the reefs, and found no bottom. Although the depth within the reef is not laid down, it is evident from several expressions, that Captain D'Urville believes that s.h.i.+ps could anchor within, if pa.s.sages existed through the outer barriers. The Chevallier Dillon informs me that this is the case: hence I have coloured this group blue. In the S.E. part lies BATOA, or TURTLE Island of Cook (”Second Voyage,” volume ii., page 23, and chart, 4to edition) surrounded by a coral-reef, ”which in some places extends two miles from the sh.o.r.e;” within the reef the water appears to be deep, and outside it is unfathomable; coloured pale blue. At the distance of a few miles, Captain Cook (Ibid., page 24) found a circular coral-reef, four or five leagues in circuit, with deep water within; ”in short, the bank wants only a few little islets to make it exactly like one of the half-drowned isles so often mentioned,”--namely, atolls. South of Batoa, lies the high island of ONO, which appears in Bellinghausen's ”Atlas” to be encircled; as do some other small islands to the south; coloured pale blue; near Ono, there is an annular reef, quite similar to the one just described in the words of Captain Cook; coloured dark blue.
ROTOUMAH, 13 deg S., 179 deg E.--From the chart in Duperrey's ”Atlas,” I thought this island was encircled, and had coloured it blue, but the Chevallier Dillon a.s.sures me that the reef is only a sh.o.r.e or fringing one; red.
INDEPENDENCE Island, 10 deg S., 179 deg E., is described by Mr. G. Bennett, (”United Service Journal,” 1831, part ii., page 197) as a low island of coral-formation, it is small, and does not appear to contain a lagoon, although an opening through the reef is referred to. A lagoon probably once existed, and has since been filled up; left uncoloured.
ELLICE GROUP.
OSCAR, PEYSTER, and ELLICE Islands are figured in Arrowsmith's ”Chart of the Pacific” (corrected to 1832) as atolls, and are said to be very low; blue.--NEDERLANDISCH Island. I am greatly indebted to the kindness of Admiral Krusenstern, for sending me the original doc.u.ments concerning this island. From the plans given by Captains Eeg and Khremtshenko, and from the detailed account given by the former, it appears that it is a narrow coral-island, about two miles long, containing a small lagoon. The sea is very deep close to the sh.o.r.e, which is fronted by sharp coral-rocks.
Captain Eeg compares the lagoon with that of other coral-islands; and he distinctly says, the land is ”very low.” I have therefore coloured it blue. Admiral Krusenstern (”Memoir on the Pacific,” Append., 1835) states that its sh.o.r.es are eighty feet high; this probably arose from the height of the cocoa-nut trees, with which it is covered, being mistaken for land.
--GRAN COCAL is said in Krusenstern's ”Memoir,” to be low, and to be surrounded by a reef; it is small, and therefore probably once contained a lagoon; uncoloured.--ST. AUGUSTIN. From a chart and view of it, given in the ”Atlas of the 'Coquille's' Voyage,” it appears to be a small atoll, with its lagoon partly filled up; coloured blue.
GILBERT GROUP.