56 BULLETIN: MUSEUM OF COMPARATIVE ZOOLOGY. 
is composed largely of the sand of calcareous seaweeds of the same species 
as those now living on the coral reef outside the barra. The exposure of 
recent sandstone here is only about two hundred metres in length, and 
the locality is a little to the north of opposite the most northern exposure 
of consolidated beach on the ocean side of this neck of land, which is 
here seven hundred and seventy metres in width. The peninsula is all 
low, flat and sandy or swampy, and there are no hills on the south side 
of the Rio Parahyba do Norte until near the city of Parahyba about. 
seventeen kilometres up the river. 
Something will be said of the physical features of the region about 
the mouth of the Rio Parahyba do Norte in the part of this paper treat- 
ing of the elevation and depression of the coast. 
The Pedra de Galé or Goyanna stone reef. — The Goyanna stone reef 
or reefs lie off the mouth of Rio Goyanna, State of Pernambuco, one part 
of it being north and the other south of the Barra de Goyanna. Only 
the northern part of this reef was examined. 
This northern reef is known to the sailors of the coast and to the peo- 
ple of the region as the Pedra de Galé or Recife de Galé! 
The country to the west is hilly (Tertiary) both north and south of 
Rio Goyanna, and the river enters the sea through a flat region. The 
outstanding point between the hills is a low sandy flat planted with 
coco palms, but further west mangrove swamps stretch across the val- 
ley. The water landward of the reef is mostly shallow. The dredge 
brought up here only sand with a few shell fragments. 
The reef is only a short one, is quite isolated, stands well out from the 
shore, and ends abruptly without any sign of a submerged continuation 
so common with the stone reefs. It is only a few hundred metres long, 
and varies in width from 15 to 25 metres. The surface is flat in the 
main, but has a gentle seaward slope. The rock is very hard and can be 
readily broken only on the projecting points left by etching. The sur- 
face is pitted unevenly, but the stone is nowhere bare. In places the 
rock is cracked, and great blocks, ten or fifteen metres across, have 
1 These reefs are not properly located on the hydrographic chart of this coast, 
The northern one is there represented as lying nine miles north of the bar: by 
measurement it is about a third of a mile. The southern reef is represented as. 
being seven miles long. That piece I did not measure, but as we saw it from our 
barcaca with the chart before us it did not seem to be nearly so long, even with all 
the outlying fragments included. The direction of the axis of the reef with refer- 
ence to the land is also incorrect: the entire northern reef is in line with the low 
flat land one quarter of a mile west of Ponta de Pedras. Its magnetic bearing is 
north 27° east. (June 17, 1899.) 
