AGASSIZ: BAHAMAS. 29 



Eleuthera. 



Plate I. ; Plate X. Fig. 2 ; Plates XXVII. to XXX. 



On both sides of the passage separating Northern Eleuthera from Eleu- 

 thera the island is so narrow that the whole surface is washed by the 

 spray from both the eastern and western sides. The surface is free from 

 vegetable growth, and the incessant action of the sea-water and of the 

 rains has honeycombed the rocks from the water up to the highest ridge 

 of the cliffs forming the eastern edge of the island. These cliffs are per- 

 pendicular, the heavy trade swells having broken off large masses of the 

 eastern sides of the eeolian hills and gradually washed them off into deep 

 water, the 100 fathom line not being more than about a mile from the 

 shore, and often much less, except at three or four points where the 

 island must formerly have extended from five to six miles farther east- 

 ward, as off Savannah Sound, James Point, and the northeast bank to 

 the eastward of Man Island. These perpendicular cliffs extend north- 

 ward and southward, and form the sea face of Eleuthera. There is no 

 shelf of any width at the base, and only along those stretches of the 

 island where the coast shelf has any width do we find extensive patches 

 of coral reefs forming a sort of banner reef; as, for instance, at irregu- 

 lar intervals all the way between Eleuthera Point, Savannah Sound, and 

 James Point, and again from Harbor Island to Egg Island, on the north- 

 east and northern faces of the outside bank. 



The photographs (Plates XXVIII., XXX.) will give a better idea than 

 could any detailed description of the honeycombed surface extending 

 north and south of the Glass Window Passage. In some cases the 

 height of these little Gothic pinnacles is nearly three feet, and walking 

 along the surface is very difficult. We met with similarly eroded sur- 

 faces at many other places in the Bahamas where the islands are narrow 

 and their surface subjected to the action of the spray or surf, in addition 

 to that of the rains in districts with a scant vegetable growth. 



In the hollows formed by the disintegration of the surrounding surface 

 there are accumulations of red earth, and there a few isolated stunted 

 bushes begin to make their appearance. They gradually pass into 

 larger patches as we come to wider parts of the islands not influenced 

 by the action of the spray, where the decomposition of the surface rocks 

 has been limited to the action of the rains. From three quarters of a 

 mile to a mile both north and south of this barren tract, which looks 

 more like an area covered with volcanic scoriae, the vegetation begins 



