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When we survey on the map the proximity of the high lands of San Domingo, Cuba and Jamaica, in the neighbourhood of the Windward Channel, the position of the island of Navaza and the bank of Hormigas, between Capes Tiburon and Morant; when we trace that chain of successive breakers, from the Vibora, by Baxo Nuevo, Serranilla, and Quita Sueno, as far as the Mosquito Sound, we cannot but recognize in this system of islands and shoals the almost-continued line of a heaved-up ridge running from north-east to south-west.

Linear strips of coral-reefs and small knolls project from many of the isolated, as well as coast-banks; sometimes they occur quite irregularly placed, as on the Mosquito Bank, but more generally they form crescents on the windward side, situated some little distance within the outer edge of the banks: thus on the Serranilla Bank they form an interrupted chain which ranges between two and three miles within the windward margin: generally they occur, as on Roncador, Courtown, and Anegada Banks, nearer the line of deep water.

The outlets of the basin, of which the four largest* are 75 miles broad, are all on the eastern side, open towards Europe, and agitated by the current of the tropics. Domingo; Jamaica, the Bank of La Vibora and the rock of Serranilla to Cape Gracias a Dios on the Mosquito Shore.