1879.] 237 (Kneeland. 
Enderbury island, in lat. 3° 8’ S., and long. 171° 8’ W., was not 
believed until late years to contain any great amount of Beye 
guano. 
According to Prof. D. Hague, in the ‘“‘ Amer. Jour. of Science,”’ 
vol. 34, 1862, whose article has been quoted by Prof. Dana in his 
work on ‘‘ Corals and Coral Islands,” the following are the charac- 
ters of the guano of the first three islands just named. 
Howland’s Island: 0° 51’ N., and 176° 32’ W. 
CHEMICAL ANALYSIS. 
Lime : : 42. 36.90 
Phosphoric Acid . 39.65 30.80 
Sulphuric Acid . 1.33 .58 
with a little magnesia and 1 per cent. of carbonic acid. 
He speaks of having found buried in the guano fragments of coral, 
of various species, in which the carbonic acid had been entirely re- 
placed by phosphoric acid, and in such specimens 70 per cent. of 
phosphate of lime~. some having in the centre a nuucleus or core of 
coral. 
Baker’s Island: 0° 13’ N., 176° 22’ W., very remote from any 
other land, except the last named (about 40 miles N. N. W.). This 
guano contains also a little magnesia and 1.25 per cent. sulph. acid: 
with lime 42.34 and phosphoric acid 40.14 —also a little carbonic 
acid and traces of iron. The surface is covered by a crust, which 
contains 40.93 of lime, 40.47 6f phosphoric acid, 5.66 of sulphuric 
acid, a very little magnesia, and mueh sulphate of lime. 
Jarvis’s Island : 0° 22’ 8, 159° 58’ W. In this the principal de- 
posit of guano, according to ine. rests on sulphate of lime (gypsum), 
the other soluble ele contained in the ocean water having been 
washed out by the rains. In fact, he believes that most of the guano 
taken from these islands rests on a bed of sulphate of lime, some on a 
coral formation, while some has been mixed with coral mud. The 
first kind is covered by a hard crust, which may be an inch thick, 
with the guano beneath; all the guano, if the deposit be shallow, may 
be in the form of this crust, snowy white or more or less tinged by 
organic matters, (not by iron), hard, irregular, and friable. In some 
islands the underlying sulphate of lime may be of a similar color 
with an admixture of phosphate of lime; this is of little value, but, 
has been mistaken for and exported as guano. 
The phosphoric acid and lime are sometimes combined as bone phos- 
