Rit BATTAMAS. 35 
around the islands is usually that of the agua-marine of beryl.” 
On its western edge, and skirting the Great Bank lies Andros 
island, much the largest of the group, being ninety-five miles 
long and haying a maximum width of thirty-eight miles, 
The Berry islands are north-east of Andros ; they are arranged 
in the form of acrescent. The horns point to the cast, and are 
separated by a distance of some forty miles. The south-west 
shore of Abaco, on the opposite side of the north-west Providence 
Channel, is only thirty miles distant from these little islands. 
The Biminis are two small islands rendered famous from the 
fact that the Fountain of Youth was reported, in the time of 
Ponce de Leon, to be located upon one of them. They are 
twenty-five miles south of the north-western portion of the 
Great Bahama Bank, and are described as ‘‘small, pretty and 
fertile.” 
The Santareen and Old Bahama Channels are south of the 
Great Bahama Bank. West of the former is situated the Cay 
Sal Bank, embracing fourtcen hundred and thirty square miles, 
including some uninhabited Keys; while south of the latter 
channel is the island of Cuba. 
Gov. Rawson states that ‘all the trade from North America 
to Cuba, St. Domingo, Jamaica, the Gulf of Honduras, and the 
northern coast of South America passes south to the windward 
[é. e. east] of the group, and close to the shores of Inagua. 
The return trade, and all the European trade from the same 
countries passes north, either through the Crooked Island pas- 
sages, or the Inagua or Caicos Channels, These islands there- 
fore lie in the track of two great streams of trade, and, at times, 
scores of vessels pass daily by the ‘ Hole-in-the-Wall,’ and the 
south western point of Inagua.” 
New Providence, upon which Nassau is situated, is upon the 
northern edge of the Great Bahama Bank, fifty miles south-west 
