102 "ALBATROSS" TROPICAL PACIFIC EXPEDITION. 



with low vegetation, and followed by numerous islets, connects the separate 

 reaches of masses of boulders. None of the boulders on the northeast face 

 are large. To the south of Makemo Pass the islands continue small and 

 low, and are covered with low shrubs. The northeast pass of Makemo has 

 on one side a steep shingle beach (PI. 59), and on the other a long low sand 

 spit, which on the sea face passes gradually into a high shingle beach fully 

 13 feet in height. The land rim to the east of the pass is well wooded 

 (PI. 75, fig. 4) for a short distance, but soon it becomes low, and consists 

 of a series of small, low islands, connected by the reef ledge of beach rock 

 or by a few small boulders. Across the lagoon the horizon was clear, and 

 only a single island could be seen in the distance on the south face. 



While at anchor in 13 fathoms we brought up in the dredge two species 

 of Madrepores and masses of broken fragments of corals, mainly Madrepores, 

 cemented together by Nullipores, worm tubes, and algae, and filled with mol- 

 lusks and worms and other boring invertebrates. Deep water runs close to 

 the shore in the lagoon wliere we were at anchor, and everywhere are 

 patches of corals to be seen, — no less than ten in our immediate vicinity. 

 To the north of our anchorage the lagoon platform is very narrow, while 

 near the pass it runs out into the lagoon in wide flats and long spits covered 

 with patches of beach rock. 



In the passage there were fine masses of coral visible everywhere along 

 our course as we entered the lagoon. The bottom was covered with huge 

 patches of algae and of coralline algiB. 



On shore near our anchorage we found in one of the gaps a fine exposure 

 of beacli rock, and of recent conglomerate made up of fragments of beach 

 rock, recent corals, and of fragments of old ledge (PL 61, fig. 2). This sec- 

 tion was taken near the base of the sea face beach, in a small canon, as it 

 were, forming the channel through whicli at high tide the sea is washed 

 into the gap and passes into the lagoon. It exposes admirably the old 

 ledge forming the base of the reef flat platform overlaid in part by the 

 beach rock conglomerate. The old ledge has been planed off and covered by 

 a thick bed of recent conglomerate, which has been washed away from |^the 

 greater part of the surface, leaving only here and there an outcrop of the 

 old ledge, or a horsehead, the upper part of which is beach rock conglom- 



