26 ALLAN HANCOCK PACIFIC EXPEDITIONS VOL. 12 



not have time to see. The few houses at Wreck Bay, the corrugated iron 

 administrative building, and the simple lighthouse had but a very few in- 

 habitants, a military guard of three men and the Commandant, who rep- 

 resented the civil and military government of Ecuador in the islands. No 

 algae were secured here, though rocky areas interrupted the sandy shore 

 around the anchorage. 



IsLA Santa Maria^^ 



By far the most often mentioned in the public press, I. Santa Maria 

 (I. Floreana or Charles Island) is one of the two southernmost of the 

 group, and not at all large. At one time the island was used as an Ecua- 

 dorean penal colony, but of this little more remained than some shelters 

 which were partly in little caves, at the time of our visit. The population 

 at that time consisted of three family groups, people who had been unable 

 to adjust to their central European homeland and had come here to try 

 under precarious circumstances to maintain themselves. Living a distance 

 apart, these groups each depended for its existence on the water from a 

 feeble spring, on a few plants grown with great effort in a small garden 

 plot, and on the wild cattle which roamed the island, since there was no' 

 considerable water source in this porous volcanic rock and no considerable 

 surface soil on the rough land for agriculture. 



The island slopes up rather gradually to the chief volcanic summit 

 and the other hills which rise over the otherwise moderately low surface. 

 The terrain is quite rough, with broken lava, and a scrubby vegetation 

 growing in the interstices of the rocks. 



One or two walks along the trail to the highest of these little clearings 

 were the extent of the botanical adventuring possible, apart from the 

 marine work which was the proper purpose of our visit. Near the springs 

 some very interesting xerophytic ferns were found, and on the trees along 

 the trail a quantity of moss and lichen growth, especially Ramalina. We 

 were unable to give time enough to go up to the summit of the island, 

 where a more lush vegetation is reported in the old crater. 



The shore collecting was done on the north coast, at Black Beach 

 Anchorage and at Post Office Bay, chiefly the former, whence a trail led 

 to the clearings. Post Office Bay is named from the barrel on a post which, 

 since the days of whaling ships, has served as a repository for mail, each 

 visiting vessel taking along what is found waiting and forwarding it from 

 the first postal port next touched. Here there was a unit of the fishing 

 settlement mentioned earlier, with a fairly good-sized building and the 



36 



Ibid., p. 227, pi. 121, 122, 123, fig. 257. 



