1901-2.] The Windward Islands of the West Indies. 353 



A few words may be said as to the means of reaching the different 

 islands. From New York the ships of the Quebec Steamship 

 Company leave on irregular dates, but averaging three or four sailings a 

 month, sometimes first touching at St. Croix, next at St. Christopher 

 (universally called St. Kitts) and then sail onward to the south. On 

 other voyages the ship calls first at St. Martin, and then proceeds 

 as before. Again St. Kitts may be the' first stop. While most of the 

 larger of the more southern islands are visited on each trip, this is by 

 no means so certain as on the north bound voyages. After touching at 

 St. Lucia, or St. Vincent, the steamers proceed to Barbados and often 

 to Demerara, and some of the tourist steamers in winter, to Trinidad. 

 Another line sails for Grenada and Trinidad direct. The Pickford and 

 Black Line, from Halifax, sails regularly every four weeks for Bermuda, 

 St. Kitts, and on to Trinidad. Local steamers of the Ro}^al Mail Line 

 sail regularly once a fortnight between the larger islands. There are 

 other occasional steamers by which passage between the islands can be 

 madfe. But to the smaller islands, one must depend upon small 

 schooners or sloops of perhaps only ten tons capacity, which may 

 usually be found sailing weekly from the larger islands, for carrying the 

 mail, etc. Thus there is a weekly sloop from St. Kitts to St. Martin, 

 Anguilla and Sombrero ; from St. Martin to Guadeloupe ; from St. 

 Croix to St. Thomas and the Virgin Islands, etc. To and from Barbados 

 and Martinique there are fortnightly steamers to England and France, 

 and other steamers to the South American ports and Colon, as also to 

 Jamaica. The Quebec Line and the Pickford and Black steamers 

 sailing among the islands usually travel at night, so that the tourist can 

 go ashore for the day and get a glimpse of these most beautiful tropical 

 lands. The coasting voyages of the Royal Mail Line give no oppor- 

 tunities for seeing the islands, as they make brief calls, day or night, and 

 then proceed onward. 



Sombrero. 



Sombrero is a lonely sentinel away out in the Atlantic, at the 

 northern end of the Windward Chain, being situated forty miles beyond 

 Anguilla. It is less than a mile long, with a breadth of a quarter its 

 length. Its flat top is pitted by former workings for phosphate of lime. 

 It is about thirty feet above the sea, with vertical walls, so that landing 

 at the foot of a ladder is difficult. It is composed of a coral-bearing 

 soft white limestone, found to be of early Pleistocene age. Pockets on 

 the surface have been converted into phosphate of lime by birds, 

 which, during some portion of the Pleistocene period, made it their 



