202 "ALBATROSS" TROPICAL PACIFIC EXPEDITION. 



We also found living amon<^ the corals a number of specimens of Centro- 

 stephanus. Dr. Mayer examined Talau to the west of Neiafu Village, and 

 collected a number of fossils at the different points. The summit varied 

 in height from 380 to 425 feet. At the base of the upper cliff the height 

 is about 325 feet. The top of the third terrace is probably 200 feet, the 

 base of the second is about 100, and the summit of the second terrace, 

 immediately to the west of Neiafu, half-way between it and the Talau, is 

 perhaps 40 to 50 feet higher. The rock at the top of Talau is a hard, 

 reddish-colored crystalline limestone, very much altered by weathering, and 

 is not fossiliferous, but fossils were collected on all the other terraces. 



On our way out from Vavau, we passed by the village of Teleki, where 

 there is an immense sink of fresh water (PI. 219), overgrown with all kinds 

 of lacustrine vegetation. The terraces to the west and south of Teleki are 

 very apparent (PI. 122, fig. 1); the top of the third terrace forms an espe- 

 cially well-marked line on many islands. Some of the islands on the south- 

 eastern part of the Vavau Plateau show indications of the second, third, and 

 perhaps the fourth terrace, but the line of the third terrace is the most 

 characteristic of all. Looking eastward between the islands of Kapa and 

 Pangai, we see a nutnber of small islands and islets with vertical faces 

 looming up in the space between tlxem and the eastern edge of the outer 

 reef (PI. 120, fig. 1). 



As we steamed past Hunga (PI. 219), we could distinctly see the stratifi- 

 cation of some of the limestone strata, which suggested an ceolian origin for 

 those beds. This a?olian limestone probably formed only a belt, blown in 

 between more solid cliffs of limestone, as both to the north and to the south 

 the cliffs resemble, in every respect, those of other parts of the Vavau 

 group. At the base of the geolian cliff we could trace a coral sand beach 

 extending as far as a gap in the uplifted limestone to the south. The ver- 

 tical cliffs of Hunga are deeply undercut and full of diminutive caverns; 

 the island slopes in an easterly direction. To the south of Hunga, the 

 Lsland of Fofoa also slopes to the eastward. It is flanked on the west by 

 low vertical cliffs of coralliferous limestone, with here and there a low sand 

 beach. Still farther south, the most southwesterly of the islands of Vavau 

 rise in sharp weathered peaks .above low vertical cliffs, and form the last 



