74 "ALBATROSS" TROPICAL PACIFIC EXPEDITION. 



Kauehi. 

 Plates 45, 201, 203. 



Kauehi was discovered by Captain Fitzroy in the " Beagle " in 1835. 

 It is nearly circular, about twelve miles long from north to soutli and nine 

 miles at its greatest width. The sketch given by Wilkes ^ is somewhat 

 different from the outline of Kauehi given by the French Hydrographic 

 charts," which are somewhat more accurate. There is no entrance on 

 the windward side, as is marked by Wilkes, and the lee face land 

 rim is covered by a far larger number of islands than are indicated 

 by him. We did not enter the lagoon, merely skirting the lee face of 

 the island. 



Kauehi is marked for the extent of the weather land rim, covered by 

 islands and islets. With the exception of a short stretch on the south- 

 eastern land rim, it is more or less protected from the trades by the atoll 

 of Raraka lying to the southeast ; the southeastern face of Raraka, as 

 sketched by Wilkes,^ plainly shows the effect of the prevailing winds on 

 the character of the land rim, which is a wide reef flat in great part 

 submerged and devoid of islands. 



Along a part of the north shore of Kauehi we came upon a stretch 

 of about a mile which was simply a mass of large boulders of old ledge i;ock 

 (PI. 45, fig. 3) spread at the base of the low beach line forming the land 

 rim of this atoll, which is very narrow, so that steaming along we could 

 look far into the lagoon over the low land rim (PI. 45, fig. 1), and could 

 see in the interior a number of ledges. Along the northwestern side 

 we came upon a cluster of large boulders of the old reef rock scattered 

 along the lagoon face of the reef flats. In the gaps and opposite them 

 the old ledge is pretty well disintegrated (PI. 45, fig. 2), forming here 

 and there small islets on the reef flats and beyond, the lagoon reef 

 flats being often very wide (PI. 45, fig. 1), and the bare flats exposed 

 to the action of the sea from both sides. Sand bars also occur on the 



» H. O. Chart 280. 



* Depot des cartes et des plans de la marine, 1716. 



a H. O. Chart 280. 



