AGASSIZ : BAHAMAS. 



51 



Opening, a distance of about eight miles, we found the bottom sloping 

 gradually, with here and there a few blades of Thalassia. It was every- 

 where composed of the same marly substance, and sustained but little 

 animal life. A few Lupas, a couple of small sharks, and the holes of 

 a Squilla seemed to be the limit of the fauna and flora of this marly 

 waste. On reaching the shore, we found the land, as far as we exam- 

 ined it, to consist of the same white marl as the bottom, but still 

 sufficiently solidified to enable us to walk upon it. It was somewhat 

 elastic, giving us the sensation of walking upon a sheet of India-rubber. 

 In some places the marl was covered with a black alga, forming a thin 

 crust, or it was often coated with a harder material composed of minute 

 fragments of shells and of sand, giving the surface a gray appearance. 

 On digging into the soil, we found the same white marl, more or less 

 mixed with vegetable matter. The shore upon which we landed was at 

 no point more than from twelve to fourteen inches above the high-water 





WEST SHORE OF ANDROS, WIDE OPENING. 



mark. The country inland seemed well covered with low vegetation, 

 and mangroves flourished in every direction. Here and there a ridge of 

 sand had been blown up, composed of fragments of shells and of crabs. 

 These ridges, rising a few inches higher than the general dead level 

 around them, formed the high ground, as it were, upon which was 

 growing a somewhat richer vegetation, composed mainly of the same 



