MEW ISLAND. 
51 
• 
circumstances? No choice remained but to make his 
way back through the difficult jungle, defiant of 
scratches, insensible to thorns, eventually to present 
himself on board, an object of astonishment to his 
wondering messmates. 
A few days later, I spent several hours in ex- 
ploring Mew Island, a little coral islet near the 
entrance of the Sunda Strait. This island is densely 
wooded to the waters edge, and is partly encircled 
by a barrier-reef. As I stepped from the boat upon 
the reef, I was struck at once with the extreme 
beauty of a species of amidiitritc, a sea- worm living 
in holes of the great solid madrepores which com- 
pose the reef. The gills of these lovely creatures 
are in the form of spiral ribbons of a brilliant 
orange-green and blue’; these -resplendent gaudy 
plumes are alternately extruded and withdrawn, 
and seen through the pellucid water, present a very 
singular and beautiful appearance. On the moist 
sand within the reef were numbers of pale grey 
crickets, veritable maritime Orthoptera, which share 
the strand With horseman-crabs, and perforate the 
E 2 
