WHO BUILT THOSE FORTS? 353 



cially in a very valuable timber which successfully resists all 

 attacks of the salt-water worm. The piles of a dry dock and 

 wharves at Shanghai, and other China ports, have been built 

 with wood brought from Kusaie. 



The Island of Ascension, or Ponape, is very similar to Kusaie, 

 excepting that it is larger and contains considerable tracts of 

 nearly level country, irrespective of the low valleys and flats 

 along the sea coast. It is the garden of the Carolines. Grand 

 streams run in all directions, and cascades which could turn 

 mills abound, while the streams in the valleys have sufficient 

 volume to float rafts, and render possible the navigation of 

 large-sized boats. 



The interior is altogether uninhabited, although covered with 

 the ruins of ancient civilisation. The natives have a supersti- 

 tious dread of going into the interior. A few years ago the 

 population was estimated at about 7000. 



Ascension has three good harbours : Metalanien, Eouankiti, 

 and Jokoits, and each of these are within a coral reef. The 

 island is divided into five districts, presided over by chiefs. 

 A few white men have settled here, and have handsome half- 

 bred children. The natives are well armed with muskets, 

 which they use principally for shooting pigeons, which abound 

 in the woods. 



The ruins on Ascension resemble those of Strong, though 

 they are much more extensive. 



Mr. C. F. Wood, in his ' Yachting Cruise in the South Seas,' 

 says in reference to these ruins of Ponape : ' On the bank of a 

 creek is seen a massive wall, built of basaltic prisms, about 300 

 feet long and 35 feet high. A gateway opening on to the creek 

 has a sill about 4 feet high made of enormous basaltic columns 

 laid flat, on passing which the traveller finds himself in a large 

 court enclosed by walls 30 feet high. Round the Avhole of this 



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