THE GREAT BARRIER REEF 317 



no time to come. It is just as I feared in the region of 

 trades — while they blow, nothing can be done, and you 

 get here and there a good day. With the prospect of 

 wind before us, it is hopeless to do anything till end of 

 July ! Hereafter I shall stick to Admiralty advice. It 's 

 a bitter experience to have wasted so much time and 

 accomplished so little after all this flourish of trumpets. 

 But I shall be glad to get home and turn down this leaf 

 of failure and forget all about it in the pleasure of get- 

 ting back." 



TO SIR JOHN MURRAY 



On Board the Croyden, 



Cooktown, Queensland, 



May 16, 1896. 



I am thankful you did not come and join this expe- 

 dition, as I hoped you would. I have never been con- 

 nected with a greater fizzle. Since we left Brisbane, 

 more than a month ago, we have had just five days of 

 good working weather. The corals here are superb, and 

 I had no conception from the West Indian reefs of what 

 a reef can be. The gigantic masses of the Astraeans, 

 Meandrina, etc., dwarf the largest masses of the Florida 

 and Bahamas, and all within six to seven fathoms, so 

 that with a water glass one can see the whole reef. The 

 most striking characteristic is the absence of Gorgonians, 

 which form so marked a feature of the West Indian reef. 

 They are replaced by the Alcyonaria tribe and by the 

 sponges and huge Actineans, the like of which I have 

 never dreamed of till I saw them figured in Kent's book. 

 Why he advised me to come here during the time of the 

 trades I cannot understand. Wharton ! warned me about 



1 Admiral Sir W. J. L. Wharton, of the Hydrographic Department of 

 the British Admiralty. 



