Comparison of the Islands. 335 



volcanic origin, and that its upheaval probably took place at 

 the same period. On the other hand, the naturalist regretted 

 to see slip the opportunity so rarely vouchsafed, of instituting 

 a comparison between the respective vegetations of these 

 islands, and of making evident how, simultaneously with the 

 advance of a more luxuriant, and more multiform vegretable 

 organization, there also appears an entirely new race of 

 animals, and how closely allied in the economy of nature is the 

 existence of individual specimens with certain fixed pre-existent 

 types. In any case St. Paul, which we enjoyed an opportunity 

 of examining in the utmost detail, is, of the two islands, 

 the most important to the commerce of the world, not merely 

 as a finger-post on the most frequented deep-sea route in the 

 Indian Ocean, but also as a haven of refuge for ships and 

 crews. Already the crater-basin of St. Paul has served in 

 case of need as a desirable asylum for ships that are half 

 unseaworthy. Not many years since an English man-of-war 

 steamer came to St. Paul, after a severe storm in the Indian 

 Ocean, during which her engine broke down, and her rudder 

 was knocked away, after which she, for twelve days, was steered 

 by a temporary rudder. The vessel, after discharging the 

 heaviest part of her equipment, was easily brought into the 

 interior of the crater-basin, and was there hove down for 

 several months on the Northern barrier, undergoing repairs. 



On the 8th December, about 4 a.m., only a dark cloud of 

 smoke in the distant cloudless horizon indicated the position 

 of Amsterdam. The island itself, properly speaking, was 



