FUNAFUTI: THE STORY OF A CORAL ATOLL. 391 



no other niamroals are indigenous, their place being taken by various 

 land crabs and spiders of many kinds. 



An examination of the rocks of a low island reveals another singular 

 feature; save for a few fragments of pumice, brought from distant vol- 

 canos by sea currents and cast by the waves upon the strand, tbey 

 present us with but one kind of material, carbonate of lime, which has 

 been extracted from solution in the sea and built up into a diversity of 

 solid forms by the agency of organisms — plants and animals, of which 

 the most conspicuous are corals. Thus but one kind of rock enters 

 into the constitution of the island, and this is limestone; of granite, 

 slate, sandstone, clay, such as we are familiar with at home, there is 

 none; all is limestone, whatever you see! 



The interest of this fact is enhanced by another. Repeated investi- 

 gation has proved that the island is not merely a residuum, a mortuary 

 of calcareous organisms, but that it is still alive and in active growth. 

 A profusion of gaily tinted corals form reefs within the lagoon, and 

 the whole of the shelving plat- 

 form, which descends from the #|> ?„£A 5fl 

 surf to a distance of 20 or 30 

 fathoms below the sea, is alive 

 with them ; this platform is in- 

 deed the true growing surface 

 of the island. 



Corals, by reason of their con- 

 siderable size and brilliant colors, first attract the attention of the 

 observer, and hence, although numerous other kinds of creatures col- 

 laborate with the corals in the construction of the reef, these islands 

 are known not only as "low" islands and "lagoon' 7 islands, but also as 

 "coral" islands, or more particularly as "coral atolls." 



The remarkable discovery that coral atolls consist of the remains of 

 animals and plants of precisely the same kinds as those which are at 

 present adding to its substance excited general interest, and led to 

 many fantastic speculations which need not now be recalled. The 

 state of opinion at the beginning of this century may best be learned 

 from the works of the poet naturalist, Chamisso, who may probably be 

 more widely known as the author of Peter Schlemihl's wunderbare 

 Geschichte (The Story of the Man who sold his Shadow) than as an 

 investigator of coral reefs. In a description, which even in the light 

 of the most recent research must still be pronounced excellent, Cha- 

 misso (fig. 1) speaks of atolls as table mountains which rise steeply 

 from great depths. The summit of the table mountain is always under 

 .water, and is covered by the living reef which surrounds its margin as 

 a broad platform and rises to the level of low tides. Sand banks rest- 

 ing on this form the dry land. Since, he observes, every particle of the 

 atoll which lies within the reach of observation consists of coral, it is 

 only just to conclude that the whole structure, including the table 



CMAMiSSO 



Fig. 1. 



