BOTANY OF THE LACCADIVES. 
is visited on that account, is doubtless incorrect; if visited at all 
it must be for birds’ eggs, or for the purpose of fishing in the lagoon. 
South-east of the Byramgore reef in Lon. 72° lO'E. and Lat. 
1 l°30'N. lies Bitrapar, visited by Mr. Hume in 1875. Mr. Robin¬ 
son had already given an account of the island.* This reef forms 
a large very regular oval 7 to 8 miles long and 4 to 5 miles across at the 
widest part. The island of Bitra, which is the only part of the 
atoll above high-water mark, occupies the north-east corner, and 
is about half-a-mile long and a quarter of a mile across, being 
nowhere more than 9 or 10 feet above high-water level. The lagoon 
is shallow at the north end and along the western side, but carries 
elsewhere 3 to 6 fathoms. The island itself is not, like the islets on 
Cherbaniani, a mere pile of coral blocks,f but exhibits the structure 
characteristic of the larger formed-islands of the group ; that 
is to say, it consists of a soil of coral-sand mixed with a 
greater or less amount of humus derived from decaying vegetation, 
this soil overlying a friable calcareous rock with a coarse oolitic 
structure, one foot to eighteen inches thick, beneath which is found 
a loose wet sand from whence, if the crust be broken through, and 
a few spadefuls of it be removed, water percolates and accumulates 
in the hollow so formed.J In Bitra, however, though the overlying 
soil is said to be excellent and the coco-nut grows luxuriantly, it is 
impossible for the people to occupy the island permanently because 
the water which accumulates in the wells made by sinking short 
shafts through this coral crust, in place of being fresh and drinkable, 
as in the inhabited islands, is so salt that the fishermen who visit the 
place, when they run short of water, dig a hole in the sand near the 
sea and drink the brackish percolations thus obtained in preference 
* Mr. Hume speaks inadvertently (“Stray Feathers,” iv., p. 435) of Mr. Robinson 
having visited this island. Mr. Robinson says (“Madras Journ.,” xiv., p. 27) that 
he was unable to visit it himself, though he obtained all the particulars he could 
concerning it. Mr. Hume’s own account is, therefore, the first description of the 
island that has been made from personal observation, 
t Hume, “Stray Feathers,” vol. iv., p. 431. 
J Robinson, “Madras Journal of Lit. and Science,” vol. xiv., p. 7; Alcock in 
Hoskyn, “ Marine Survey Report,” 1889-90, p. 12. 
. 307 
