4 MY ISLANDS. 



accordingly, whence they would derive the first seeds of 

 life, and what changes would take place under dint of 

 time upon their desolate surface. 



For a long epoch, while the mountains were still rising 

 in their active volcanic state, I saw but little evidence of a 

 marked sort of the growth of living creatures upon their 

 loose piles of pumice. Gradually, however, I observed 

 that spores of lichens, blown towards them by the wind, 

 were beginning to sprout upon the more settled rocks, 

 and to discolour the surface in places with grey and 

 yellow patches. Bit by bit, as rain fell upon the 

 new-born hills, it brought down from their weathered 

 summits sand and mud, which the torrents ground small 

 and deposited in little hollows in the valleys ; and at last 

 something like earth was found at certain spots, on 

 which seeds, if there had been any, might doubtless 

 have rooted and flourished exceedingly. 



My primitive idea, as I watched my islands in this 

 their almost lifeless condition, was that the Gulf Stream 

 and the trade winds from America would bring the 

 earliest higher plants and animals to our shores. But in 

 this I soon found I was quite mistaken. The distance to be 

 traversed was so great, and the current so slow, that the 

 few seeds or germs of American species cast up upon the 

 shore from time to time were mostly far too old and 

 water-logged to show signs of life in such ungenial con- 

 ditions. It was from the nearer coasts of Europe, on 

 the contrary, that our earliest colonists seemed to come. 

 Though the prevalent winds set from the west, more 

 violent storms reached us occasionally from the eastward 

 direction ; and these, blowing from Europe, which lay 



