CHAPTER XII. 



CONCLUSION. 



ON completing our surveying work at the Ainlrante Group 

 we steamed back to Port Mahe, Seychelles, in order to 

 replenish our stock of coals. After a stay of a few days we 

 again got under way (17th of April), and shaped a course for 

 Alphonse Island, which occupies an isolated position sixty 

 miles south-west- by-south of the southern extremity of the 

 Amirante bank. 



We reached Alphonse Island on the 19th of April, about mid- 

 day, and saw that in shape, and general appearance, it much re- 

 sembled one of the Amirantes — for instance, Poivre ; but, however, 

 in one important characteristic was different. It possessed a sort 

 of barrier reef little less than a wash, and sufficiently indicated 

 by a long line of heavy breakers. We steamed round the island, 

 holding a course parallel to the line of breakers, and within a few 

 ships' lengths of it, but we got no soundings with fifty fathoms of 

 line. On attaining a position opposite to the southern extremity 

 of the island, we saw a canoe approaching, the occupants of which, 

 an elderly white man and some negroes, soon afterwards boarded 

 us. The information which they gave us confirmed our im- 

 pression as to there being no anchorage suitable for a large ship 

 anywhere near tiie island. We learned that it was the property 

 of a Frenchman named Baudon, who resides in Europe, and that 

 the population consisted of twenty-eight, si.x being whites — viz., 



