THE MALDIVES 395 



fathoms. I paid special attention to sounding all the 

 channels and a few lines at right angles to the Plateau 

 of the Maldives. 



The weather has been superb — we lost only one day. 

 Taking all our meals on deck, we were driven below only 

 one day in the South Maldives at Addu, where it always 

 blows and rains pitchforks. The Sultan was most atten- 

 tive and so were all the natives. 



Agassiz had now visited practically all the important 

 coral reef regions of the world, and in no single instance 

 had he seen an atoll or barrier reef whose formation he 

 thought could be satisfactorily explained by subsidence. 

 It naturally followed that his final conclusion was a 

 total dissent from Darwin's theory on the subject. 



It had always been Agassiz's intention to embody his 

 coral reef investigations in a semi-popular summary ; 

 somewhat such a treatment of the subject as the " Three 

 Cruises of the Blake " was of oceanography. This un- 

 finished book caused him much trouble ; he never took 

 kindly to semi-popular work, and although in the last 

 few years of his life he was constantly returning to it, 

 he was not convinced of its utility. He used to say that 

 all his views on the subject could be found in his vari- 

 ous reports ; he did not realize that those interested in 

 such matters were waiting for him to summarize his 

 work. 



He is thought to have recast the book more than 

 once. The material he left furnishes an excellent ex- 

 ample of his method of carrying his work in his head 

 until the last moment. At his death nothing could 

 be found but a vast collection of extracts from the 

 literature of the subject marked and scored, and a few 



