152 



THE NATURALIST IN AUSTRALIA. 



time there is a distinct southerly intrusion of the equatorial waters of the Indian 

 Ocean, at some distance off shore, down towards, though not absolutely reaching, 

 the Abrolhos Islands. 



Further substantial evidence supporting the correctness of the interpretation 

 here submitted, is afforded by the results of synchronous readings of the sea tempera- 

 ture obtained by the writer with the assistance of Mr. G. Beddoes, Mr. Broadhurst's 

 managing partner, in the vicinity respectively of the Abrolhos Eeefs and at Champion 

 Bay. These taken in the early morning of July, midwinter, 1894, at three feet 

 below the surface of the water exhibited a difference of from ten to fourteen degrees 

 Fahrenheit ; readings at the Abrolhos averaging 69 and 70, while those at the 

 Geraldton Pier registered as low as 56. 



Many of the zoological data recorded in this Chapter were, it may be 

 mentioned, embodied in a paper contributed to the 1895 Norwich Meeting of the 

 British Association, and are published in abstract in the Proceedings for 

 that year. Figures and descriptions of a lizard species, Egernia Stokesii, which is 

 particularly abundant on Gun Island, in the Abrolhos group, will be found in 

 Chapter III. 



W, Samlle-fent, Photo. 

 ABROLHOS CORAL, Madrepora protaifarmit, p. 142. ONE-SEVENTH NATURAL SIZE. 



