CORAL ISLANDS. 75 
rock is either a compact limestone, showing no traces of its composite 
origin, or a conglomerate. Beach, regular as usual, 6 to 10 feet high, 
consisting of coral sand, and fragments of worn shells, with occasional 
exuvie of crabs, remains of echini, fish, &c. The entrance to the 
lagoon is deep and narrow, with vertical sides. 
Aratica or Carlshoff, Paumotu Archipelago, 15° 30’ S. 145° 30’ W. 
17 miles by 10, trending N.E. Large lagoon, with a good entrance for 
vessels. The reef fronting south, bare for nine miles: on northwest 
side, mostly very low, with only here and there a clump of trees; 
occasionally a line of wooded land for a quarter of a mile on the east 
side; more continuously wooded on the north. The bare parts, mostly 
covered with blocks of coral, 1 to 30 cubic feet, and larger, tumbled 
together, as on the preceding. Some blocks of coral on the shore plat- 
form very large; one 8 feet high and 15 in diameter, containing at least 
1000 cubic feet: it lay on the reef and was not connected with it; below 
it the platform was 6 inches higher than the surface either side, owing 
to the action of the sea. These blocks are in all instances rough 
angular, and appear as if they had been thrown up by the sea, and 
left exposed to wear from the rains and spray. 
Nairsa or Dean’s, Paumotu Archipelago, 15° S. 148° W. 44 miles 
by 17, trending W.N.W. Northern shore mostly wooded. Southern 
only an occasional islet, connected by long lines of bare reef. In these 
intervals the reef stood eight feet or so out of water, and was worn 
into a range of columns, or excavated with caverns, so as to look very 
much broken, though quite regularly even in the level of the top 
line. 
We might continue these descriptions; but the above will convey 
a general idea of the whole. 
ce. The Completed Coral Island. 
The coral island in its best condition is but a miserable residence 
for man. ‘There is poetry in every feature: but the natives find this 
a poor substitute for the breadfruit and yams of more favoured lands. 
The cocoanut and pandanus are, in general, the only products of the 
vegetable kingdom afforded for their sustenance, and fish and crabs 
from the reefs their only animal food. Scanty too is the supply; and 
infanticide is resorted to in self-defence, where but a few years would 
