74 bulletin: museum of compakative zoology. 



combined action of the rain and sea. Behind the shore line of rocks 

 extend vast flats, the pine barrens of the island. The seolian rocks are 

 everywhere fully exposed, presenting the peculiar characteristics of the 

 great expanses of level or nearly level surfaces which in other islands 

 frequently separate parallel ranges of seolian hills. In the sinks and 

 pot-holes, or depressions of greater dimensions, pools and ponds, often 

 of considerable size, have accumulated, many of which are sepai'ated from 

 the sea only by the narrow wall forming the low line of seolian hills im- 

 mediately back of the shore. 



The shores of Bahama Island, all the way from Carrion Crow Har- 

 bor to our anchorage at Turtle Reef near High Rock, have once been a 

 succession of coral sand beaches and of low cliffs along the edge of the 

 low line of hills, forming a sort of dam between the pine tract levels and 

 the edge of the island. Beyond Turtle Reef the extension of this line of 

 hills forms a few insignificant cays to the west of Gold Rock. The reef is 

 outside of this line of cays, which represents a part of the ancient shore 

 line of Bahama Island. The reef dies out at Southwest Point, where 

 the shore is clear close up to the beach. Beyond Southwest Point, at 

 Barnard's Point, the low shore hills with vertical cliffs are again char- 

 acteristic of the shore line, the pine barren plains appearing to be from 

 one half to three quarters of a mile behind the beach mound. Wherever 

 there is any outcropping of rocks between the stretches of coral sand 

 beaches, many blocks of seolian rock are thrown up above high-water 

 mark. There are a number of these rocky outcrops, and as we go 

 north past Southwest Point the sandy beaches become shorter and 

 are much more frequently interrupted by considerable lengths of out- 

 crops. Hawk's Bill Creek is an estuary which has cut Bahama Island 

 in two, and which comes out on the north side. The shore line of 

 cliffs leaves a wide opening flanked with mangroves and shrubs ; in 

 the distance are the pine barrens about one mile inland. Soon after 

 leaving Hawk's Bill Creek the pine barrens recede farther from the 

 shore, and towards the narrower part of the northern extremity of the 

 island the pines diminish gradually in size and in thickness, becoming 

 quite scattered. The low range of shore hills increases in width, ex- 

 tending farther inland. The continuation of the northern extrem- 

 ity of the island consists of four or five small cays, the remains 

 ol the former northern extension of Bahama Island. These small 

 cays are of the usual type ; the rocks are seolian, with vertical faces 

 more or less undermined, and the surface of the islets pitted and honey- 

 combed. As the pines diminish north of Hawk's Bill Creek, their 



