Ch. III. FRINGING BEEFS. 75 



and in the other at 18°. The upraised reefs round 

 this island have been much less worn and modified by 

 the action of the sea, than in most other cases. 



Many islands 1 are fringed by reefs quite similar to 

 those of Mauritius : but on coasts where the sea 

 deepens very suddenly, the reefs are much narrower, 

 and their limited extension seems evidently to depend 

 on the high inclination of the submarine slope ; — a 

 relation which, as we have seen, does not exist in reefs 

 of the barrier class. The fringing-reefs on steep coasts 

 are frequently not more than from 50 to 100 yards in 

 width : they have a nearly smooth, hard surface, 

 scarcely uncovered at low- water, and without any 

 interior shoal channel like that within those fringing- 

 reefs which lie at a greater distance from the land. 

 The fragments torn up during gales from the outer 

 margin, are thrown over the reef on the shores of the 

 island. I may give as instances, Wateeo, where the 

 reef is described by Cook as being 100 yards wide ; 

 and Mauti and Elizabeth 2 Islands, where it is only 

 50 yards in width : the sea round these islands is very 

 deep. 



1 I may give Cuba, as another instance; Mr. Taylor (London's Mag. 

 of Nat. Hist. vol. ix. p. 449) has described a reef several miles in 

 length between Gibara and Vjaro, which extends parallel to the shore 

 at the distance of between half and the third part of a mile, and en- 

 closes a space of shallow water, with a sandy bottom and tufts of coral. 

 Outside the edge of the reef, which is formed of great branching corals, 

 the depth is six and seven fathoms. This coast has been upheaved at 

 no very distant geological period. 



2 Mauti is described by Lord Byron in the voyage of H.M.S. Blonde, 

 and Elizabeth Island by Captain Beechey. 



