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In some cases, fringing-reefs appear to be considerably modified in outline by the course of the prevailing currents. Dr. J. Allan informs me that on the east coast of Madagascar almost every headland and low point of sand has a coral-reef extending from it in a S.W. and N.E. line, parallel to the currents on that shore.
It was when this marine building had risen to within eight or ten feet of the surface of the sea that the Walrus chanced to draw near to it, but no one on board was aware of the existence of that coral-reef, for up to the period we write of it had failed to attract the attention of chart-makers.
The 'Saginaw' was an American war-ship that had been sent with a contract party to Midway Island in the North Pacific some fifteen hundred miles west-north-west of the Sandwich Islands to blast the coral-reef there, in order to provide a harbourage for the line of large steamers running between San Francisco and China.
The polyps and other organisms, whose remains accumulate to form a coral-reef, simply live and perform their natural functions, and then die, leaving behind them, in the natural course of events, the hard calcareous portions of their structures to add to the growing reef.
We got out of the lanes, and entered a stretch of open water at 11 a.m. A strong easterly breeze was blowing, but the fringe of pack lying outside protected us from the full force of the swell, just as the coral-reef of a tropical island checks the rollers of the Pacific.
SECTION OF CORAL-REEF. A'A', Outer edges of the barrier-reef at the level of the sea, with islets on it. B'B', The shores of the included island. CC, The lagoon-channel. A''A'', Outer edges of the reef, now converted into an atoll. C', The lagoon of the new atoll.
"We have already satisfied our just vengeance, and do not let us destroy the innocent with the guilty. Some years ago a ship from Africa, laden with the children of her fruitful soil torn cruelly from their homes, struck on a coral-reef. A heavy sea dashed over the devoted vessel. Land was in sight, but yet far-off, blue and indistinct. The white crew had many boats.
We are standing now on one of the last remaining scraps of the old Atlantic land. Look down the bay. Do you see far away, under, the mountains, little islands, long and low? Oh, yes. Some of these are old slate, like the mountains; others are limestone; bits of the old coral-reef to the west of Ireland which became dry land. I know. You told me about it.
An eddy, at the inner side of the opening, swept it round, and fixed the end of one of the largest spars of which it was composed on the beach. There were fifty yards or so of sandy coral-reef between the beach outside, that faced the sea, and the beach inside, which faced the land; yet how great the difference!
There was one place that I wished, particularly, to visit before I left, and that was what the people in Nassau called the Coral-reef. There were lots of coral-reefs all about the islands, but this one was easily visited, and for this reason, I suppose, was chosen as a representative of its class.
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