346 ALDERNE Y. 
town of St. Anne’s, situated almost in the centre of the island, is 
unpretentious, clean, and healthy, and comprises a greater number 
and variety of shops than the visitor would expect to find. It is 
built on the upper slopes of the hill overlooking the harbour, the 
most conspicuous building being the handsome church, erected 
.about fifty years ago to replace a very ancient one, which dated from 
the early part of the twelfth century. 
At the present day the population of the island is much less than 
it was during the middle of the century, when the Government works 
were constructed. It varies according to the strength of the 
garrison ; but the civil population amounts to about 1500, and as a 
general rule from 300 to 400 soldiers are quartered here. 
Owing to its situation at the entrance of the English Channel, 
Alderney has always been regarded as an outpost of great military 
importance, and enormous sums of money have been expended by 
our Government in constructing a long chain of forts and batteries 
all round the low-lying coast, as well as in erecting a breakwater, 
which, through some blundering in the design, is unfortunately less 
useful than was originally intended. 
Westward from Alderney several groups of islets and rocks 
‘stretch out for many miles, and. when viewed from the heights of 
Butes Hill, compose a picture of rare beauty. The uninhabited 
island of Burhou (a description of which will be found elsewhere in 
these pages) is par excellence the seabirds’ home, and is seldom in- 
vaded by man, except during the nesting season. This desolate 
islet lies on the other side of the passage called the Swinge, one of 
the most dangerous pieces of water in the English Channel. To the 
right are the Nannel Rocks, to the left Ortach, rising out of the sea 
like a colossal haystack. Further away, seven or eight miles from 
Alderney, glitters the white tower of the Casquets Lighthouse, 
marking the most perilous reef on the British coast, where, as 
Shakespeire says of the Goodwins, ‘the carcases of many a tall ship 
lie buried ’—and a spot memorable for many a long year to come by 
the dreadful wreck of the steamship S¢e//a, on the eve of Good 
Friday, 1899. 
The Casquet Rocks lie almost exactly midway between Weymouth 
and St. Malo, and are the outposts of a gigantic natural breakwater 
partly submerged, forming the northern arm of the great bay in 
which the Channel Islands are situated. ‘If the sea-bottom were 
elevated a hundred and twenty feet,’ says Ansted, ‘the island of 
Alderney, the Burhou and Ortach group, and the Casquets would be 
‘connected by low land, and form a narrow island about twelve miles 
long. ‘The eastern extremity of this island would approach within a 
few miles of the coast of France, and it would range nearly parallel 
to the south coast of England between Weymouth and the Isle of 
Wight.’ 
The geology of Alderney in the main resembles that of the sister 
