1836.] FIELDS OF DEAD CORAL. 441 



and two boats were then employed in catching them. The water 

 was so clear and shallow, that although at first a turtle quickly 

 dives out of sight, yet in a canoe or boat under sail, the pursuers 

 after no very long chase come up to it. A man standing ready in 

 the bow, at this moment dashes through the water upon the turtle's 

 back ; then clinging with both hands by the shell of its neck, he is 

 carried away till the animal becomes exhausted and is secured. It 

 was quite an interesting chase to see the two boats thus doubling 

 about, and the men dashing head foremost into the water trying to 

 seize their prey. Captain Moresby informs me that in the Chagos 

 archipelago in this same ocean, the natives, by a horrible process, 

 take the shell from the back of the living turtle. " It is covered 

 with burning charcoal, which causes the outer shell to curl up- 

 wards ; it is then forced off with a knife, and before it becomes cold 

 flattened between boards. After this barbarous process the animal 

 is suffered to regain its native element, where, after a certain time, 

 a new shell is formed ; it is, however, too thin to be of any service, 

 and the animal always appears languishing and sickly." 



When we arrived at the head of the lagoon, we crossed a narrow 

 islet, and found a great surf breaking on the windward coast. I 

 can hardly explain the reason, but there is to my mind much 

 grandeur in the view of the outer shores of these lagoon-islands. 

 There is a simplicity in the barrier-like beach, the margin of green 

 bushes and tall cocoa-nuts, the solid flat of dead coral-rock, strewed 

 here and there with great loose fragments, and the line of furious 

 breakers, all rounding away towards either hand. The ocean 

 throwing its waters over the broad reef appears an invincible, all- 

 powerful enemy ; yet we see it resisted, and even conquered, by 

 moans which at first seem most weak and inefficient. It is not that 

 the ocean spares the rock of coral ; the great fragments scattered 

 over the reef, and heaped on the beach, whence the tall cocoa-nut 

 springs, plainly bespeak the unrelenting power of the waves. Nor 

 are any periods of repose granted. The long swell caused by the 

 gentle but steady action of the trade-wind, always blowing in one 

 direction over a wide area, causes breakers, almost equalling in force 

 those during a gale of wind in the temperate regions, and which 

 never cease to rage. It is impossible to behold these waves without 

 feeling a conviction that an island, though built of the hardest rock, 

 let it be porphyry, granite, or quartz, would ultimately yield and 

 be demolished by such an irresistible power. Yet these low, insig- 



