98 bulletin: museum of comparative zoology. 



feet high. North of East Hill a number of hills rather higher than those 

 of the south shore extend to Northeast Point. A number of low hills 

 from thirty to ninety feet in height skirt the southern face of the island ; 

 when approaching them from the south, as we did in coming from Cape 

 Maysi, they appear like distinct islands. The hills are covered with 

 stunted bushes and palmettos. The west shore is comparatively low, 

 Mortimer Hill north of Mathew Town being its highest point. Beyond 

 Alfred Sound on the north shore rises James Hill, about ninety feet 

 high, the only elevation west of Carmichael Point ; flanking Ocean Bight 

 are a number of hills from seventy to ninety feet in height. The interior 

 of the island is low, wooded, and intersected by many salt water lagoons. 

 A recent coral sand beach, quite steep, is the landing place of Mathew 

 Town to the north of the lighthouse. The material for the beach comes 

 in part from the wearing of shore coral sand rocks which extend all the 

 way along the coast from the Lighthouse Point northward, and in part 

 also from the fragments of the belt of coral reef which grows upon the 

 narrow coast shelf of the island. The low plain forming the greater 

 part of Inagua Island apparently consists of shore coral rock rising but 

 a few feet above high-water mark, which has been deposited in the sinks 

 between the seolian hills flanking the northern and southern shores. The 

 aeolian hills rise from the northern and western ends of the island, and 

 increase in height to the eastward. This plain is fairly covered with 

 vegetation and with coarse grass, and aff"ords excellent pasturage for 

 cattle and horses, which run wild over the island. 



The eastern face of the island is skirted by a reef from six hundred 

 feet to half a mile from. the shore, the 100 fathom line being about half 

 a mile from the reef Nearly the whole of the south shore is also sim- 

 ilarly skirted by a reef, with the exception of a short distance round 

 Southwest Point on the west coast. The coral growth is in patches, the 

 water off" shore being bold and the 100 fathom line close to the land. 



Alfred Sound on the east side of Northwest Point in Inagua is an 

 anchorage for small vessels, protected by a reef nearly dry at low water, 

 which runs out from Palmetto Point at a distance of a mile and a half 

 from the shore. Standing at the western opening of the reef harbor 

 are two low cays covered by a little vegetation, and connected by a reef 

 or patches of corals and Gorgonia3 growing in the shallower water. To 

 the eastward a long spit extends, formed by a coral reef, inside of which 

 no less than seven fathoms are found in places. At the east end of the 

 spit the reef is quite awash, and the course of the reef is clearly indicated 

 by the long horseshoe-shaped line of breakers. The reef which extends 



