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ffmgmjetxts ut ^ticttjcje. 



The Origin of Coral Island Forms. — 



This much-discussed question lias been 

 raised again by the boring operation of Pro- 

 fessors Sollas and David at the island of 

 Funifuti. Their results, as far as they have 

 been announced, seem to confirm Darwin's 

 theory of subsidence. But now we have a 

 letter (American Journal of Science, Febru- 

 ary, 1898) from Alexander Agassiz, who is 

 at present with a scientific expedition in the 

 Fiji Islands, announcing observations which 

 seem to point toward elevation rather than 

 subsidence. Professor David's bore hole at 

 Funifuti was carried down six hundred and 

 ninety feet, and a preliminary examination 

 of the core indicated that the reef had been 

 built up in the immediate neighborhood, at 

 any rate, of growing coral. Portions of 

 true reef were found in various positions 

 throughout the whole depth. There seems, 

 however, to be a possibility that the boring 

 was situated on a very steep slope of vol- 

 canic rock, covered by a talus of coral de- 

 bris from a reef on the summit. A further 

 and fuller report from Professor David will 

 no doubt clear up some of these uncertain- 

 ties. The material received from Mr. Agas- 

 siz is only that contained in a private letter. 

 Much to his own surprise, he found the gen- 

 eral appearance of the islands to indicate, 



if not prove, that elevation rather than sub- 

 sidence had taken place. After recalling Pro- 

 fessor Dana's statement of the beautiful illus- 

 tration which the Fijis gave of the gradual 

 changes brought about by subsidence, he 

 says : " My surprise was great, therefore, 

 to find within a mile from Suva an elevated 

 reef about fifty feet thick and a hundred and 

 twenty feet above the level of the sea, the 

 base of the reef being underlaid by what is 

 locally called soapstone, probably a kind of 

 stratified volcanic mud." Many other traces of 

 extensive elevation were noted. At Tarutha, 

 for instance, the coral limestone bluffs were 

 probably eight hundred feet high. From a 

 series of such observations Mr. Agassiz " is 

 inclined to think that the corals of to day 

 have actually played no part in the shaping 

 of the circular or irregular atolls scattered 

 among the Fiji Islands ; furthermore, that 

 they have had nothing to do in our time 

 with the building up of the barrier reefs 

 surrounding either wholly or in part some 

 of the islands. I also believe that their 

 modifying influence has been entirely limited 

 in the present epoch to the formation of 

 fringing reefs, and that the recent corals 

 living upon the reefs, either of the atolls or 

 of the barriers, form only a crust of very 

 moderate thickness upon the underlying base. 



