38 THE CORAL REEFS OF THE MALDIVES. 



twenty-four to thirty-five fathoms. Another faro in the pass to the north 

 of Imiua (PI. 15, fig. 2) is crescentic. One side is formed by an island 

 extending into a sand-bar, while on the other the island extends into a 

 submerged rim ; the horns of the crescent are widely separated, enclosing 

 a deep lagoon. The southern part of Tulusdu faro as seen from the west 

 appears like a narrow, shallow lagoon, enclosed between two strips of 

 shallow flats. 



We steamed round a large faro with a wide reef flat rim nearly a mile 

 and a haK in diameter, about four miles to the west of Difuri, and with 

 nine fathoms in the lagoon ; a wide flat makes off the eastern part of the rim 

 of this faro. The great Difuri faro has even more than Tulusdu and 

 Hulule the characteristics of an atoll ; as seen from the west, the lagoon 

 studded with coral heads is seen to be separated from the inner waters of 

 North Male by a narrow rim flat extending from the northern horn to the 

 southern extremity. The eastern reef flat rim is in places nearly a mile 

 wide. To the north of this lagoon reef in the centre of the pass (PI. 4) is 

 situated a long comma-shaped faro nearly three miles in length and perhaps 

 half a mile wide at the club. 



The faros of North Male are most irregular in shape, some are crescentic, 

 others more or less rectangular, others somewhat polygonal, or dumb-bell- 

 shaped, or circular with long spits, or they have assumed the shape of a 

 long series of loops or cusps forming angular spits. An examination of the 

 chart of North Male (PI. 4) will show their great diversity in shape and 

 size. Yet it is a simple matter to reduce these protean shapes to a simple 

 and common origin. The circular faros occur in the sheltered waters of 

 North Male, where corals are left to grow with but little interference from 

 the monsoons or currents which have tended to modify their outlines on 

 the outer rim parts of the Maldive plateau, where they are exposed to the 

 full force of the prevailing winds. 



To the west of the comma-shaped faro we came upon a maze of banks 

 and small faros ; that part of North Male not being as yet surveyed, we did 

 not dare to push north, but shaped our course for the west face of North 

 Male. We found the western slope of Difuri faro much less abrupt than 

 that of other faros we had examined. About quarter of a mile from the 



