324 APPENDIX. 



The islet which we have named {Vtle cmx Fols) Booby Island,^ 

 is a rock, with its summit pointed, something like a cone of iron, 

 without soil or grass ; it may be about a qnarter of a league in 

 circumference. This rock is covered with birds, which are called 

 Fols," and which lay three times in the year ; these creatures are 

 of the size of a young pigeon ; they kill them with stones and 

 sticks. They do not lay from the montli of January until April. 

 Their eggs are of the size of those of a hen, and are very good to 

 eat, and even served us as soap for washing. 



Diamond Island 3 (/'i7e aux Diamants), which is to the south 

 of the preceding, is almost of the same form, of the same size, and 

 of the same material ; there are also (Fols) boobies upon it, who 

 live on fish. There are no land turtle on these two islets. 



The two {Ues de sable) sandy islands,"* which are to the iiorth- 

 west of the island, are covered during severe hurricanes {grands 

 coups de vent), excepting the larger, which is most to the west, 

 Avhich is full of (Ghiendent) short grass, as well as Shearwaters 

 (Fotiqnets). There are no land-tortoises, either on one or the 



1 Booby Island, a conical mass of basalt rock fifty feet high, forms 

 one of the marks for vessels entering and leaving Mathurin Bay ; it is 

 one mile inside tlie reef bordering Mathurin Bay. {Vide Chart, p. 49 ; 

 cf. Finlay, I. c, pp. 515, 516.) 



2 Fols. " These birds", says M. Mihie-Edwards, " are evidently not 

 boobies {Fous), but probably belong to a species named Pterodroma 

 ciferrima (Verrcaux), which to this day frequent the coasts of the 

 Mascarene Islands." {Vide ante, 82, 178.) 



3 Diamond Island, a similar basaltic rock, is a little more than a mile 

 south of Booby Island, at a cable's length from the headland, west of Baie 

 aux Hudres, and forms a conspicuous sea-mark fifty feet in height. 



* Sandy Island, only fifteen feet, opposite the oj^ening in the reef, 

 Pasi^e De^nie, and Cocoa Island, south of it, are mere sand-kays, near 

 the western edge of the encircling reef, nearly two miles west of Pte. de 

 la Ponce. The name Cocoa Island seems to indicate that cocoa-nut 

 trees have grown there, and the Chiendent growing on it is a species of 

 herb, Cynodon Dacti/Ion. A low scrub grows on both islands now {Hid., 

 p. 514). The He de Fouquets, here mentioned, must not be confounded 

 with Booby Island, which is bare rock, but refers to the islet, to the 

 south-east, hereafter mentioned as the Isle aux Fols et Fouquets, near 

 Passe Platte (cf. Balfour, I.e., p. 365). 



