660 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. [56] 



Watling's, like all the islands of the Bahama group, is made up of 

 coral limestone, much weathered upon the surface, and below it of a 

 very cavernous nature. A great part of the interior of the island is 

 occupied by a series of connecting lakes, which are surrounded by hills 

 rising quite abruptly from the water to a height of 50 to 140 feet, and 

 thence sloping more gradually to the ocean. Between the hills and 

 the ocean are a number of large swamps, hardly above tide- level. 



The coast-line is partly rough coral rock rising abruptly from the 

 water, partly stretches of coral sand, and the island is pretty well sur- 

 rounded by outlying coral reefs. Though there is little soil, the greater 

 part of the island is clothed with a dense, low, scrub growth, with here 

 and there a large tree to indicate what the timber was in old times. 

 The surface has been quite extensively under cultivation, but since the 

 abolition of slavery nearly all the white people have left the island, and 

 the negroes cultivate lielcls only here and there, and scarcely do more 

 than get a living off the ground. 



The swamp water is pretty much all brackish, but fresh water can 

 be had at any point by digging down to near the ocean level. It col- 

 lects slowly and is subject to a rise and fall with the tide. 



We found the rough, coral bottom near the shore ill adapted to sein- 

 ing, and the inhabitants brought in but few species of fish caught with 

 hook and line. 



A trip across the island to a creek on the eastern coast resulted in 

 the capture of a number of species of fish. There was little opportu- 

 nity to haul the seine, but we made a number of sets across the mouths 

 of small creeks, and then drove the fish down into the net. 



From the lakes we seined a large number of minnows, Atherina stipes 

 — a species most plentiful in these waters and apparently the only fish 

 occupying them. 



The lake water is very saline and subject to a slight rise and fall 

 with the tide, though there is no apparent connection between the lakes 

 and the ocean. 



We made a trip through the lakes to a cave near the new light-house 

 at the northern end of the island, and from which several human skulls 

 are said to have been taken. The cave is near the lake, in the face of 

 a low semicircular ledge of limestone. The mouth of this cave, about 8 

 feet long by 2 feet in height, was originally walled up. It now stands 

 open, the wall having been pulled down. Within, the cave extends 

 about 50 feet along the face of the ledge on each side of the entrance, 

 and the low roof meets the floor about 20 feet back. It is divided into 

 several chambers by natural columns rising from the floor to the roof. 

 The largest of these chambers extends back to a pool of brackish water 

 on the lake level, and it was from this chamber that we made our col- 

 lections. A careful search through the other parts of the cave revealed 

 no human remains, and only a few small bits of broken pottery. The 

 outer wall of the cave is a mass of stones, piled up to the roof, through 



