CHAPTER X. 

 CORAL ISLES 



T^ORTUNE favoured the Ornithologists' Union 

 H when it organised an expedition to the Capri- 

 -^- corn Group, at the southern extremity of the 

 Great Barrier Reef. The use of the Federal 

 Fisheries Investigation vessel Endeavour, as a trans- 

 port, was granted, and the captain and crew rendered 

 assistance which smoothed more than one rough place. 

 The steamer conveyed us to and from the mainland 

 and the isles; we enjoyed short cruises aboard her, 

 and the skipper sent gifts of fish to our camps. The 

 farewell cheers that were given when we returned to 

 Gladstone were not formal, but prompted by gratitude 

 to our sailor friends. 



The Capricorn Archipelago was visited by Pro- 

 fessor Jukes in 1843, in H.M.S. Fly, and, so far as 

 known, no other naturalists worked among the isles 

 until 1904, when Mr. C. Hedley, F.L.S., of Sydney, 

 and several of his friends, spent a week on Mast Head. 

 In his paper on the mollusca of the reef,* Mr. Hedley 

 states that, strictly speaking, the group is not a part of 

 the Great Barrier, which ends in Swain Reefs, a coral 

 maze, north of the Capricorns, between which and the 

 islands lies Curtis Channel, which is broad and deep. 

 But, he adds, for zoological purposes, these pseud- 

 atolls may conveniently be regarded as a continuation 

 of the Great Barrier. We met Mr. Hedley in Sydney, 

 and from him obtained information which proved of 

 great service. He warned us not to be far out on the 



*Proceedings of the Linnean Society of Neiv 

 South Wales, 1906, Vol. XXX., Part 3. 



