voyage for the discovery of southern lands.

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of five or fix. Its wefiern coaft, altogether expofed to the fury of the wind frm feais briftled with breakers, againft which the waves dafh with a frightful noife. In frontof its northern extremity is the little iflet, Koks (Cox), a wild rock joined to themain nearly by a chain of reefs. All the eaftern fide is indented and craggy; buthere the waves break with lefs impetuofity than in the weft ; on which account it iseafy enough to land from the little creeks.

The fand of the fhore is quartz mixed with a large portion of calcareous ruins muchattenuated. The fubftance of the ifland even is compofed, in its inferior beds-, of acalcareous Ihelly freeftone, fometimes whitifh, fometimes red, depofited in horizontallayers, the thicknefs of which varies from two to three decimeters *, and which, beingextremely uniform in their projection, offer for mafon’s work ftones already half pre-pared by nature.

The fhells encrufted in the mafs of thefe rocks, are almoft all of them univalve ; theybelong moft particularly to the genus natice of M. De Lamarck, and have great affinityto the fpecies of natice found alive at the foot of thefe rocks : they, doubtlefs, havebeen petrified many ages back, for, feparate from their being exceedingly difficult toextraCt from the {tone, in confequence of their clofe adhefion, they are obferved atthe depth of more than 50 meters f below the prefent level of the fea.

However great the regularity of thefe layers in general, they are yet not all of themhomogeneous in their fubftance ; there is in particular a variety of fpecies of thefe rocksmore remarkable in their ftruCture. Thefe are, aggregated calcareous pebbles (filiculi),in fandy, ochrous earth, which adheres to them with fuch tenacity, that the gangue is notto be feparated from the pebbles but by breaking both. All thefe pebbles are of glo-bular form, and are compofed of a great number of concentric zones which furround akernel confiding of a hard and brownifti freeftone that yields fparks. The differentftrata round the kernel are but a few millimeters in thicknefs, and have different co-lours, from a deep red to a bright yellow. The general difpofition of this breccia givesit a coarfe refemblance to the globular granite of the ifland of Corfica, while, by itsribbony and concentric beds, it has fomewhat the appearance of the agathes-onyx. It ismoreover fufceptible of polifh, and might be rendered fubfervient to different objectsof fervice, or even of luxury,

The beds of freeftone of different kinds conftitute, to fpeak properly, the entireof this country, but on the rocks themfelves is impofed a ftratum of fand of lefs orgreater depth, which is fpread over the whole ifland, rifing near its edges into a fortof girdle of very moveable downs, from 20 to 2 6 meters + high. This fand, fimilarto that of the fhore, is very calcareous, of an extreme fine grain, which fhould feem torender it liable to be readily difperfed by the winds, and confequently to caufe the faceof the ifland to be changed according to their caprice and violence. We fhall fpeedilyfee the counteradUon of nature to prevent diforders of this kind.

The mineralogical account I have fketched of the ifland Bernier applies In the moftprecife manner to the iflands Dorre and Dirk-Hartighs ; wffiat I am about to faythe animal and vegetable productions of this ifland is alfo equally applicable 10 theothers. Under this point of view, its hiftory in general becomes more intereftmg?and is deferving that detail which I have deemed juft to give of all its conftituentparts. Let us only add to thefe primary confiderations, that in no part whatever areany fources of fpring water to be found, or any trace of conftant moifture.

On fuch a foil it is of ready conjecture vegetation can but be wretched, and in a

* 7 1 - to 12 inches Eng. f 163 feet Eng. % 6j to £4 feet Eng.

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