CHAPTER XIII. 



THE BERMUDAS. 



^,HE little Bermudas group, which rises in absolute isolation above 

 the Atlantic abysses, still bears under a sHgbtly modified form 

 the name of the Spanish navigator, Bermudez, by whom it was 

 discovered about the beginning of the sixteenth century. Some 

 hundred years later it was re -discovered by Somers, an English 

 explorer ■saIio had deviated from the usual track. Henceforth the archipelago 

 frequently took the name of Somer's Islands, sometimes changed to Summer 

 Islands, as if in reference to their mild climate, described as an " everlasting 

 summer." But the name of the first discoverer ultimately prevailed. 



The group lies in the broad Atlantic about 600 miles east of Cape Hatteras, 

 the nearest point on the North American mainland. The distance is much 

 greater from the Bahamas, although the Bermudas belong rather to this archi- 

 pelago than to the continent so far as regards the aerial and marine currents, 

 which set either north-east and south-west or south-west and north-east. In 

 the same direction are disposed the submarine plateaux on which stand the 

 Bermudas and their prolongation, the Challenger and Argus banks. The axis 

 intersecting the diameter of the Bermudas would also traverse the two south- 

 western banks, while its extension would about bisect the chain of the Bahamas. 



Physical Features. 



Altogether the Bermudan islands and banks form a nearly regular oval stretch- 

 ing north-east and south-west a distance of about 23 miles; but only a very 

 small part of this space is occupied by dry land. The whole plateau enclosed by 

 the six-fathom line comprises a superficial area of 264 square miles, whereas the 

 Bermudas properly so-called have an extent of only 20 square miles at low water, 

 that is, scarcely one-thirteenth of the rocks raised from the abysmal depths by 

 the coral builders. The portion rising above sea-level is disposed along the 

 eastern margin of the Bermudan plateau, and then bends round southwards in 

 the form of a hook. It consists of one island, with sharp headlands projecting 

 westwards like the horns of a beetle, and of some fifteen narrow islets disposed 

 in a line with Great Bermuda. Including all the uj)heaved reefs, the cluster 

 comprises at least 150 distinct rocks, and "more than the daya in the year," 

 62 



