AGASSIZ: FIJI ISLANDS AND CORAL REEFS. 63 
that the honeycombed pitted pinnacles of hard ringing limestone should 
be mistaken by inexperienced observers for volcanic clinker-like rocks, 
and the locality described as volcanic, especially when taken in connec- 
tion with the crater-like aspect of the sounds. The island is surronnded 
by a fringing reef nearly a mile in width in some places, and with a pas- 
sage forming a shallow and very narrow lagoon with a depth of four to 
five fathoms between the outer reef flat and the shore line along parts of 
the eastern and of the western face of the island. There is a narrow 
passage (Plate 82) on the northeastern face into the interior basin, but 
too shallow to have admitted the “ Yaralla.” In addition there are also 
a number of openings between the numerous islands and islets into 
which the elevated limestone ridge has been cut up (Plate 80). Through 
all these the current flows with considerable velocity (three knots). The 
EAST SIDE OF FULANGA. 
interior of the basin is full of islets and of rocks, mushroom-shaped or 
dome-shaped, all deeply undercut and all consisting of the same elevated 
limestone of which the outer ridges are composed (Plate 81). These 
islets and rocks are of all sizes and shapes, some of them nearly half a 
mile in length ; and they are found in every part of the basin (Plates 
83,84). The greatest depth of the interior basin is ten fathoms, with 
an average of five to six. 
Although the general appearance of Fulanga is much like that of an 
extinct crater, yet its formation is due to other than volcanic agencies. 
The whole of the area of Fulanga must formerly have been covered by 
a bed of raised coralliferous limestone. The lower parts of the eastern 
face of this elevated flat became cut up into islands and islets, allowing 
the passage of the sea, and it has little by little eaten into the body of the 
elevated limestone, forming an extensive inner basin four miles in length 
