GoRAM. 375 



unless they are derived from Arab priests, or had j is returned 

 from Mecca, who may have heard of the ancient prowess of 

 the Turkish armies when they made all Europe tremble, and 

 suppose that their character and warlike capacity must be 

 the same at the present time. 



GOEAM. 



A steady south-east wind having set in, we returned to 

 Manowolko on the 25 th of April, and the day after crossed 

 over to Ondor, the chief village of Goram. 



Around this island extends, with few interruptions, an en- 

 circling coral reef about a quarter of a mile from the shore, 

 visible as a stripe of pale-green water, but only at very lowest 

 ebb-tides showing any rock above the surface. There are 

 several deep entrances through this reef, and inside it there 

 is good anchorage in all weathers. The land rises gradually 

 to a moderate height, and numerous small streams descend 

 on all sides. The mere existence of these streams would 

 prove that the island was not entirely coralline, as in that case 

 aU the water would sink through the porous rock as it does 

 at Manowolko and MatabeUo; but we have more positive 

 proof in the pebbles and stones of their beds, which exhibit 

 a variety of stratified crystalline rocks. About a hundred 

 yards from the beach rises a wall of coral rock ten or twenty 

 feet high, above which is an undulating surface of rugged 

 coral which slopes downward toward the interior, and then 

 after a shght ascent is bounded by a second wall of coral. 

 Similar walls occur higher up, and coral is found on the high- 

 est part of the island. 



This peculiar structure teaches us that before the coral was 

 formed land existed in this spot ; that this land sunk gradual- 

 ly beneath the waters, but with intervals of rest, during which 

 encircling reefs were formed around it at different elevations ; 

 that it then rose to above its present elevation, and is now 

 again sinking. We infer this, because encircling reefs are a 

 proof of subsidence; and if the island were again elevated 

 about a hundred feet, what is now the reef and the shallow 

 sea within it would form a wall of coral rock, and an undula- 

 ting coralline plain exactly similar, to those that still exist at 

 various altitudes up to the summit of the island. We learn 



