214 ISLES OF SUMMER. 
hama waters, and afford one of the principal attractions for 
those who visit this part of Queen Victoria’s possessions. We 
have seen and studied them at various times and under different 
circumstances, and yet we feel, not only that our knowledge of 
them is imperfect and superficial, but that we can convey to 
others only a crude and unsatisfactory reflection of the impres- 
sion they made upon our own mind. The effect is heightened 
by all the surrounding circumstances. There is nothing to an- 
noy or produce any but pleasurable sensations. New but con- 
genial friends meet together by asubtle law of attraction, recline 
on the cushions, occupy the comfortable chairs, or sit on the cir- 
cular seats of the ‘‘Trident,” the ‘‘ Gazelle” or the “Frolic.” 
Té is, to be sure, mid-winter, but no northern summer air ever 
seemed half so soft, soothing and voluptuous. We have not known 
each other long, and yet there is such an absence of reserve, such 
an interchange of thought, such an expression of pleasurable 
emotions, and such a telling of rich and racy anecdotes, that a 
looker-on would have supposed we were life-long acquaintances 
and friends. Feasting and surfciting upon types and forms of 
beauty never seen or even imagined in our colder climes, it was 
a relief to be aided in the audible expression of delightful emo- 
tions by the combined vocabularies of our little group of ex- 
plorers. : 
Visits to the coral beds and reefs are made exceedingly attrac- 
tive by reason of the peculiar clearness and beauty of the water 
over which we sail to reach them and in which they are found. 
No snow fed mountain torrent was ever more clear and trans- 
parent, and, as the water-bed is white limestone, objects at the 
bottom can be seen with great distinctness. On one occasion of 
relatively smooth water, a mile or so outside of the bar of Nassau 
harbor, we clearly saw the bottom at a depth of about seventy 
feet. The sounding line showed seventy-six feet, but some dis- 
