226 
himself to mentioning some few of the conclusions he has 
arrived at during a residence of five weeks on the Islands. 
He must confess that he had made these observations quite 
unexpectedly and wholly unprepared for the facts ascer- 
tained, having up to that time accepted without question the 
common belief respecting the nature of the Whuano and its 
mode of formation; it being supposed to consist entirely of - 
the simple accumulation of the excrements, dropped upon 
the Islands by various species of sea-birds. In fact he had 
only desired to pay a flying visit to the Chinchas and not 
leave that part of the world without at least satisfying a nat- 
ural curiosity to see so remarkable a phenomenon. What 
he had seen on the first day of his visit had proved so much 
at variance with what he had expected that he was tempted 
to prolong his visit, at considerable inconvenience, to the 
space of time mentioned. 
From the very first inspection of the deposit, which was 
extensively exposed by its removal being carried on contin- 
nally, he was forced to admit that the mode of its formation 
was not as simple as, until then, it had been supposed to be. 
During this sojourn of five weeks the time was employed in 
carefully studying and sketching not alone the deposits of 
Whuano on the different Islands, but also the nature of the 
various rocks of which the Islands themselves are composed. 
From these observations he had arrived at conclusions which 
must eventuate in the adoption of entirely new views regard- 
ing the formation of the Whuano. 
In the first place the Whuano on these Islands is by no 
means a homogeneous mass of substance, but, on the contrary, 
presents itself as made up of two distinct portions, which dif- 
fer widely the one from the other in the character of their 
constituents as well as their structure and evident mode of 
formation. The outer and uppermost portion everywhere 
overlying the other is the lesser in respect to quantity and 
does consist of the droppings of various species of sea-birds 
and mammals mixed with the feathers and eggs of the former 
and bones of both birds and mammals. This stratum occurs 
in various conditions of preservation and decomposition, and 
