382 Mr. Couthouy’s Reply to Mr. Dana. 
dwelt upon at some length in the manuscript.” The simple 
truth is, my information that the Gallapagos, and the three first 
named Atlantic islands, were destitute of coral, was derived on 
my passage from Sydney to Tahiti, in the spring of 1840, from 
Dr. Brown, the surgeon of the vessel, and Capt. Rugg, the com- 
mander, the latter of whom, especially had spent many months 
among the Gallapagos, and though utterly unacquainted with 
natural history, had been struck, nevertheless, with this peculiar 
feature, as something curious, and different from any of the other 
tropical islands of the Pacific, among which he had been cruising 
for several years. He attributed it to the sulphurous salts with 
which the earth at these islands is every where impregnated, af- 
fecting the water to such a degree, that corals could not live in it. 
I was at first inclined to coincide with him, but reflecting that 
this explanation could not apply to the like absence of corals in 
the Atlantic islands, was led to suspect that it would be found 
owing to the low temperature of the ocean. 
This suspicion, however, I only verified while the sheets of 
my article were passing through the press, by an examination of 
the meteorological tables in the appendix to King and Fitzroy’s 
voyage, for a knowledge of which I was indebted to my friend, 
Dr. A. A. Gould. From the same work, and at the same time, 
were derived all the local temperatures of the Pacific, specified in 
my article.* On the other hand, the fact of coral reefs existing 
at Bermuda, so far beyond their general limits, is a fact in itself 
so remarkable, that the most casual observer would scarcely fail 
to have his attention drawn to it, in connection with this subject 
of temperature; and I think it will be conceded, that to have 
passed over them in silence would have been far more extra- 
ordinary, than that I should have remarked concerning them, 
‘though unable to speak positively from having no data; as to 
the Bermudas, I have no doubt from their proximity to the Gulf 
Stream, that they are washed by an equally warm sea.”>+ This 
is the extent of my observations upon “anomalies,” which were 
“dwelt upon at some length in the manuscript” of Mr. D., “laid 
open most confidingly” for my perusal at the Sandwich Islands, 
and thus much, I trust, it has been shown I had other means of 
arriving at, without abusing the confidence of Mr. D. But I 
* Vide Boston Journal Nat. Hist., Vol. IV, p. 160. + Op. cit. p. 160. 
