204 CORALS AND CORAL ISLANDS. 
board, and was worn into a range of columns, or excavated 
with caverns, so as to look very much broken, though quite 
regularly even in the level of the top line. 
We continue these descriptions with notes on some coral 
reefs and islands of the Atlantic, derived from the charts of 
the ocean and different publications mentioned beyond. 
Florida Reefs. — The position of the Florida coral reefs, 
and of the Bahama Islands with reference to Florida and 
Cuba, and to one another, and the depths over and among 
the reefs, are shown on Plate XI., which is taken from one 
of the Atlantic Ocean charts of the United States Hydro- 
graphic Department.’ 
The Florida coral formations are mainly great reef-made 
banks. They commence on the east coast, at Cape Florida, 
in latitude 25° 40’ N., continue around the south extremity 
of the peninsula, and stretch westward to and beyond Key 
1 The chart is Sheet One of the North Atlantic Ocean, Lower Part (No. 21). 
It has great geological interest; for it includes all the West Indian and Gulf seas, 
with also the Bermudas and northern South America to the equator, and gives all 
soundings to date of publication. This chart and another of the Florida reefs and 
Bahamas on a still larger scale (No. 944) are the best sources of information as to 
the extent, positions, forms, general characters, and relations of the reef regions, 
and the distributions of islands and keys; and detailed descriptions are of little 
value without them. 
The more important sciéntific accounts of the Florida reefs are the following: 
Prof. Louis Agassiz’s Memoir, published, in part, in the Coast Survey Reports for 
1851, and entire, with added illustrations of West India corals, in the Memoirs of 
the Museum of Comparative Zodlogy, vol. vii. 1880; M. Tuomey’s paper in the 
American Journal of Science, 1851, 2d ser., xi.; Publications of F. de Pourtales, in 
the Bulletin of the Museum of Comparative Zodlogy for 1867, 1868, 1878, and his 
Report on Deep-Sea Corals in the Illustrated Catalogue of the Museum, in 1871; the 
excellent and finely illustrated work of Mr. Alexander Agassiz, entitled the “ Three 
Cruises of the Blake,” in two volumes, 1888; besides papers by Mr. Agassiz in the 
Bulletin of the Museum of Comparative Zoology, and in the Memoirs of the American 
Academy, 1883, xi. Other papers are those of Prof. Joseph Le Conte, American 
Journal of Science for 1857, xxiii., 46, on the Agency of the Gulf Stream in the For- 
mation of the Peninsula and Keys of Florida; and Capt. E. B. Hunt, U.S. A., ibid., 
1863, xxxv., 197, on the Origin, Growth, and Chronology of the Florida Reef. 
