SAND ISLANDS. 37 



G8 fiitliomg ; and from this depth it shoals gradually toAvard the 

 shores of the island, which is situated near its eastern extremity. 

 Sable Island itself is about 23 miles in length, and from one mile 

 to one and a half in breadth. It is distant about 85 miles from the 

 nearest part of Nova Scotia. Its surface consists entirely of light 

 gray or whitish sand, rising in places into rounded hills, one of which 

 is stated by persons who have visited the island to be 100 feet in 

 height. The whole of this sandy surface has evidently been washed 

 and blown up by the sea and wind ; and I have not been able to 

 learn, from any of the accounts of the island, that any more solid 

 substratum exists. Pools of fresh water, however, appear in places, 

 wliich would seem to imply that there is an impervious subsoil. 

 This may, however, be caused by \X\q floating of rain water on water- 

 soaked sand, an appearance which may sometimes be observed on 

 ordinary sand beaches, where, in consequence of their resting on the 

 surface of the sea-water, these pools or springs sometimes rise and 

 fall with the tide. I am not aware, however, that this occurs at 

 Sable Islaiid. There is also a large salt-water lake or lagoon, which 

 at one time formed a harbour ; but its entrance was closed by a storm. 

 The surface of the island is covered with coarse grass and cranberry 

 and whortleberry plants ; and horses, rabbits, and rats have been 

 naturalized and exist in a wild state. The Government of Nova 

 Scotia, aided by an annual sum from Great Britain, supports an 

 establishment on the island for the succour of shipwrecked mariners. 



Captain Darby, late superintendent of the establishment on the 

 island, states, in a letter contributed to Blunt's Coast Pilot, that within 

 twenty-eight years the western extremity of the island has decreased 

 in length seven miles. He also states that the island has been 

 increasing in height, especially at the eastern end, and at the same 

 time diminishing in width. He believes that the bank and bar 

 extending from the western end have been constantly travelling to the 

 eastward. It would indeed appear from the difference in the longitude 

 of the island, as given in the old charts and by late surveys, that the 

 whole island is moving eastward ; a very natural effect of the prevail- 

 ing westerly wind, which must continually shift the particles of sand 

 from west to east, and may eventually throw the island over the edge 

 of the bank into deep water, and cause it to disappear ; unless indeed 

 the whole bank is moving in the same direction under the influence 

 of marine currents. A singular intermixture of animal remains may 

 be produced by this movement of a sand island, tenanted by land and 

 fresh-water creatures, over the surface of a marine sandbank remote 

 from land, and which otherwise would contain only deep sea shells. 



