4 PROFESSOR W. J. SOLLAS. 



wheels, and the nature of the ground, seemed to put traiisportation by land out of 

 the question. 



At last, liowever, Mr. Hedley pointed out to me a portage called Luamanif, used 

 by the natives for dragging their canoes from the lagoon to the seaward side of the 

 island, which at this place is very narrow, about 70 yards across. As this seemed a 

 good landing-place, I submitted it to the consideration of Captain Fteld, who, after 

 a personal examination, agreed that we might safely make use of it. Ayles and his 

 party were then set to work to sink trial pits on the line of the portage ; one of these, 

 situated 70 feet from the high-water mark on the seaward face of the reef, was sunk 

 12 feet througli sand and blocks of coral, when operations were brought to a close 

 owing to the influx of sea-water at high tides. Two other pits were then commenced 

 nearer the sea and a little to one side (north) of the portage, at the margin of the 

 solid jjlatform of rock, which extends down to the growing edge of the reef and 

 is covered by the sea at high-water. These passed through sand and fragments of 

 coral. In the most northern of the two pits the sand was somewhat consolidated, 

 and so, proceeding a few yards further north, as far in that direction as it would 

 have been possible to transport our machinery, we opened another pit, which was 

 sunk for a depth of 1 1 feet through fragments of coral, crystalline coral limestone, 

 and partly consolidated sand. The bottom of the pit was 2 feet below the seaward 

 margin of the reef, and, as we were not inconvenienced by an influx of sea-water, and 

 Ayles was of opinion that the rock would " stand," we decided to make our new 

 venture at this spot (see fig. 2). Taking into consideration the difiicultles of trans- 



Fio;. 2. 



Trial p/i /. 



Site of Borini ..^. 

 Oce&r) fac<s. 

 NW.iet^el 



porting our apparatus, I do not think a more favourable locality could have been 

 shosen ; it was close to the very edge of the rocky platform, which is so hard that 

 Darwix, speaking of a similar platfoim in the case of another reef, says " I could 

 with difiiculty and only by the aid of a chisel jirocure chips of rock from its surface " ; 

 and as near the sea as it was jDrudent or even possible to go. Indeed, we had at 

 first some doubt as to whether our pumping pipes would "live" in the surf of 

 the ocean margin, and feared that the high-water spring tides might inundate 

 the shaft ; our fears in these respects, liowever, proved to be groundless. 



Captain Field and myself were impressed with the need of additional boring 

 apparatus, and he proposed that Ayles should go to Sydney to see if it could be 

 procured. I gave much anxious consideration to this project, and discussed it with 

 my colleagues, Messrs. Hedley and Gardiner, and with Ayles. ' The information 

 I received from Ayles was not encouraging. He stated that we should require a 



