NEAR WRECK BAY. 



327 



ral small patches of reef, which gradually become 

 stronger and more connected as it trends to the north, 

 and reassuming the barrier character, run nearly 

 north for nine or ten miles. These arc then 

 suddenly deflected to the south-east, and run out in 

 that direction for eight or nine miles, forming the 

 northern boundary of the bight in the reefs, now- 

 known by the name of Wreck Bay. The mouth of 

 this bay is six miles wide from north to south, ex- 

 panding inside to twelve or thirteen ; its length 

 from east to west is about eight miles. The depth 

 of water in this bight is very great, no bottom hav- 

 ing been reached, except close to the reefs, and 28,5 

 fathoms, or 1,710 feet, having failed to strike bottom 

 on its southern side, within three miles of a small 

 reef, and four miles inside the reefs forming the 

 entrance to the bay. 



On the northern side of this deep-water hay is a 

 curious projecting buttress of reefs, the northern 

 boundary of the bay, after running out nine miles to 

 the south-east, being sharply deflected to the north, 

 and then to the north-west, so that we have a 

 narrow loop of reefs enclosing a space of water 

 from ten to twenty fathoms deep, ten miles 

 long, and only two broad. After running round 

 this loop the reefs run first N.N.W., and then 

 N.N.E., to lat. 11° 45'. Here they are again 

 broken through, and w r e have only a bank of sound- 

 ings twenty or thirty fathoms deep, with small de- 

 tached patches of reef on it, running north for eleven 



