104 THE CORAL REEFS OF THE MALDIVES. 



As we steamed along the eastern face of Ari, we could see that the 

 eastern part of Ari was filled with numerous diminutive banks and faros 

 and coral heads which render its navigation dangerous (PI. 4). We entered 

 Ari north of Digura by a pass (PI. 55, fig. 2) nearly two miles wide. 

 To the north of the pass the faros are closely packed and irregular in 

 shape, — dumb-bell, comma, circular, or crescentic in outline. Dugati, 

 immediately north of the pass, is a crescent-shaped faro enclosing a lagoon 

 of from five to seventeen fathoms and edged on the western face by a 

 similar crescent made up of a line of small banks, the southern horn of 

 which is flanked by a belt of corals awash. The southern face of Ari is 

 flanked by two large reef flats separated by Ariadu, a large irregularly 

 circular island with deep passes on either side. 



On the eastern part of the western reef flat are four islands, the largest 

 of which is Mamigeli (PI. 56). Three lagoons are enclosed within the flat, 

 the two largest on the western part of the reef flat. 



Digura Island is nearly two miles in length ; it flanks the eastern rim of 

 a wide lagoon with from four to seven fathoms of water. The northern 

 part of Digura Faro is more than two miles wide. On the western part of 

 the same lagoon reef flat are Didu and two other islands. To the south of 

 Digura Island a line of small islets extends towards Kuraf uri ; the gaps 

 between the islets are nearly filled by sand spits and bars which will 

 eventually unite the two larger islands. On the outer face of Digura a 

 long line of large black boulders crops up on the edge of the eastern rim 

 flat; on its western slope a magnificent belt of corals extends from twelve 

 fathoms to the surface ; they extend eastward along the edge of the rim 

 flat far towards the lagoon slope. The edge of the western reef flat is 

 quite irregular; at a short distance from the outer edge huge coral knolls 

 rise nearly to the surface from a depth of twelve to fifteen fathoms, form- 

 ing a series of submarine buttresses more or less connected with the corals 

 growing on the western face. At many points they have thus materially 

 widened the area of the rim flat on the west of Digura lagoon. We found 

 only a few patches of corals on the bottom or slopes of the rim of the lagoon; 

 nowhere perhaps have we seen a finer example of the great development of 

 corals on the so-called lagoon face of the land rim of an atoll, as at Digura. 



