WORTHINGTON : ORNITHOLOGY OF UaHAMA ISLANDS. 399 



farther in those directions than would have been possible otherwise. 

 The south shore, like all sand-beaches in the Bahamas, is composed 

 of disintegrated coral rock and shells, while shallow sand-flats extend 

 for miles off the actual shore-line. Just back of the beach are a few 

 small lagoon-like ponds, with scattered mangroves. This region 

 was remarkably deficient in bird-life, only a few Bahama Red-wings 

 and Bahama Green Herons being seen about the ponds. 



Work was carried on from this base until January 21, when passage 

 was taken on the fifty-ton mail schooner "Estrella," under the com- 

 mand of Captain Storr, bound for Great Inagua, the southernmost 

 island of the group, but making numerous detours and stops on the 

 way, to deliver and receive passengers and mails. We got away 

 from the Nassau wharf on Friday morning, January 22, with a hold 

 full of cargo of almost endless variety, and a cabin full of passengers 

 — all colored e.\cept ourselves — but, as in the case at Miami, we did 

 not get very far. Before we were fairly out of the harbor, with 

 a strong head w-ind, and a current running against us like a mill-race, 

 beating down between Hog Island and Potters Cay, the steering gear 

 gave waj- as we attempted to come about, and instead of making the 

 tack as intended the "Estrella" ran with considerable force on the 

 rocky shore of Potters Cay, where she remained until again floated 

 by a gang of wreckers at nine P.M. on January 23, when she was 

 anchored in the stream for a fresh start. Early the next morning we 

 got under way, beat up around the east end of New Providence, and 

 laid our course southeast by east, with a good stiff trade breeze from 

 the northeast. By noon New Providence had sunk below the horizon, 

 and Highborn Cay was in sight on the port bow. We passed Ship 

 Channel Light at seven P.M., and entered the deep blue waters of 

 Exuma Sound, laying a course for Cat Island. On the morning of 

 January 25 we got a faint glimpse of the south point of Eleuthera 

 Island, looming out of the haze to the northward, but it soon faded 

 from view. A stiff breeze was blowing and the " Estrella" was jumping 

 around in a rough sea, but we found smoother water under the lee of 

 Little San Salvador, and spent the rest of the day beating dead to 

 windward, sunset finding us three of four miles off Bennet's Harbor, 

 Cat Island. We continued on with a light wind and reached Arthur 

 Town, our first stopping-place, at eight P.M. Our journey was 

 resumed after the mails had been put ashore, but the wind died out, 

 and until the next morning we lay becalmed, several miles to the west 



