I.] GEOGRAPHICAL FEATURES. 21 



passed, as it did in 187-4, when the Japanese invaded the island. 

 But how long the unoccupied portion of Formosa will remain so is 

 another question, and, bearing in mind the great resources and 

 important position of the island, its leading characteristics are 

 worthy of a moment's consideration. 



The island of Formosa, one-third only of which lies within the 

 tropic, is some two hundred and ten miles in length, and about 

 seventy in breadth. It is separated from the mainland of China by 

 the Formosa Strait, which is barely seventy miles in width opposite 

 Foochow, but nearly two hundred at the southern entrance. This 

 channel is, however, somewhat narrowed by the Pescadores Islands, 

 a group lying about twenty miles westward of Formosa, and pos- 

 sessed of good harbours. The soundings in this channel show the 

 island to be connected with the mainland by a submarine bank 

 submerged to a depth of from twenty to forty fathoms only. The 

 eastern face of the island, however, abuts immediately upon the deep 

 sea, and soundings of a thousand fathoms or more are found within 

 a very short distance of its shores. It thus formed the eastern 

 limit of the vast continent with which, at no very remote geological 

 period, the islands of Borneo and Sumatra were also united. 



Apart from the fertility of its soil, and its supposed richness 

 in minerals, the geographical position of Formosa is such as to 

 render it a possession of extreme importance with regard to Eastern 

 trade. Swatow, Amoy, and Foochow lie actually withm the For- 

 mosa Channel, while every vessel bound to and from the northern 

 Chinese ports and Japan is obliged to pass through it. The total 

 foreign trade of the latter country is valued at over twelve million 

 pounds sterhng, and of this Great Britain absorbs more than two- 

 thirds. The foreign trade of China is, of course, considerably greater. 

 In 1881 it amounted to over forty million pounds, of which nearly 

 thirty-two million was credited to England and her colonies. The 

 occupation of Formosa by a nation possessing a fleet of any strength, 

 would therefore prove a most serious affair for England in the event 

 of war. The island has often been descril^ed as witliout harbours of 



