2o8 



The National Geographic Magazine 



lieves that what he saw and reported 

 was in fact a shoal, but probably located 

 a few miles out of his reckoning. He 

 did not stop his ship to sound, but esti- 

 mated the depth of water on the shoal 

 to be thirty to forty feet, or, sa_v, five 

 to seven fathoms; and it is curiously in- 

 teresting to note the singular coincidence 

 between this estimate and the depth of 

 "six or seven fathoms" actually found 

 by sounding on another remotely related 

 shoal observed and reported many years 

 since, a recent reference to which is con- 

 tained in a letter from Professor George 

 Davidson, at San Francisco, an eminent 

 authority on oceanography, who writes : 



"Yesterday (January 9, 1906) I was 

 browsing among old navigators, and in 

 Burney, vol. I, pages 228 and 229, I came 

 on the following, in the voyage of Vil- 

 lalobos: 'Dec. 3 (1542) they discovered 

 banks on which they had only six or 

 seven fathoms.' The pilot's statement : 

 'and we sailed beyond Roca Partida 

 about two hundred leagues, when we had 

 soundings in seven fathoms, being then 

 in 13 degrees or fourteen degrees north 

 latitude, and no land in sight ; but we be- 

 lieved ourselves to be near the Island San 

 Bartholomeo.' " 



This observation antedates Captain 

 Lawless's by three hundred and sixty 

 years ; but it is somewhat more reliable 

 than his, because of the actual soundings 

 that were taken at the <-ime, which have 

 the same important significance as if 

 made yesterday. Such a shoal is evi- 

 dence of an elevated sea bottom and is 

 an indication of a shoal region, in which 

 there may be coral reefs near enough to 

 the surface to menace navigation, and 



where there might be islands, possibly 

 habitable, and, in that case, now inhabited 

 by the survivors of shipwreck. In fact, 

 during the three hundred and sixty years 

 of elapsed time a coral island may have 

 been formed on this same shoal. Such 

 an island, developing conditions favor- 

 able to the support of life, like scores of 

 tropical islands elsewhere, might have 

 become habitable long ago. 



The region from which this report 

 apparently comes (two hundred leagues 

 westerly from Roca Partida, shown on 

 the charts) is perhaps ten degrees east 

 and eight or more degrees south of the 

 assigned position of the reef over which 

 the sea was breaking, as recently re- 

 ported by Captain Rose of the bark 

 Michelet; but it is within the great, gen- 

 erally landless, ocean area of which we 

 have but comparatively little information 

 and hardly any knowledge concerning 

 the elevations and depressions of the sea 

 bottom. 



The traffic of this hitherto-unfre- 

 quented region is steadily increasing. 

 Steamships between San Francisco and 

 Tahiti traverse it occasionally in north- 

 erly and southerl)^ directions, and the 

 American-Hawaiian Steamship Company 

 has just now inaugurated a fortnightly 

 service between Hawaii and the Mexican 

 coast, which will pass through this region 

 in easterly and westerly courses ; and 

 when the Panama Canal is open for busi- 

 ness the movement of ships in these 

 waters will be constant. With these con- 

 ditions in view, it seems obvious that a 

 complete survey of the region should 

 presently be made in the interests of com- 

 merce and navis;ation. 



