there, had died, and there was no European left. In 1908 there were 80 white employés of the Pacific Phosphate Co., 350 Japanese, and some 700 labourers of the Gilbert and Ellice Islands, besides the 470 aboriginal natives who still survive.

im

The discovery of the mense potential wealth of Ocean Island is one of the romances of the Pacific, and for the exact truth of the story I am not prepared to vouch, but of its general accuracy there is no question. A piece of phosphate rock which was brought to Sydney on board a steamer which called off Ocean Island in 1896 or 1897, lay in the office of the Pacific Islands Co., in Sydney, for many months, and was used, it is said, to keep an office door open.

The stone

attracted the attention of a man in the service of the Company, who had a wide experience of the islands in the Pacific from which guano and phosphate had been for years collected. He expressed his opinion that the specimen in the office would be found to contain phosphate of lime. The office did not agree with him, but he persisted, and had the stone submitted to chemical analysis. The result amply confirmed his view, and gave a percentage of 80 per cent of pure phosphate of lime (which is, I believe, the highest known), and further revealed none of those mineral impurities found in many other such products. As the result, a steamer visited Ocean Island

with the discoverer, who lived there for some months and, after his investigation, arrived at the astounding conclusion that almost the whole island consisted of pure phosphate of lime of the same wonderfully high grade as the first specimen. Here, then, was an immense fortune in view, for the lowest estimate placed the phosphate deposit at many millions of tons, and the gradual exhaustion of the wheat-growing areas of the civilised world, and the intense cultivation of Japan, demanded an ever-increasing supply of this great fertilising product. An agreement was made with the native chiefs and people of the island for the removal of the phosphate, a ship-of-war declared the island a possession (not a Protectorate), and finally, a lease was obtained from the Crown giving the Company the sole right to export phosphate from Ocean Island. By this tenure the island is now held, and year by year improvements are made in the methods of winning and shipping the rock. Long iron and concrete cantilever piers jut out over the narrow fringing reef, and by means of capacious surfboats loaded at these wharfs, and splendidly handled by native crews, over 1100 tons of phosphate can be shipped in one working day. Large steamers take the product to all parts of the world, the chief purchasers being perhaps the Japanese. And so this lonely rock, barren and desolate, supporting a struggling native community, has become a focus

of extraordinary commercial activity, an important shipping centre, and the richest island in the Western Pacific.

I am, however, not so much concerned with this interesting but commercial phase of the history of Ocean Island as with the appearance and formation of, and the life upon, this wonderful place. The natives are very interesting, and provide a striking example of the colonisation of Pacific Island Sporades from a parent stock by means of the regular currents and winds which prevail in this immense ocean.

The island is roughly round in shape, save for a bay which extends for about three-quarters of a mile along the southern face, and in which is the only natural landing-place for boats or canoes. The diameter is about the same, north and south and east and west, roughly 1 mile, and the highest point is about 280 feet over the sea-level. The coral reef which clings closely to the coast all round the island is at no place more than 150 yards broad (in some places it is far narrower), and beyond the edge of the reef the water deepens very rapidly, the land running down at an angle of 45 degrees, so that at 1200 feet horizontal distance from the shore there is a depth of 1200 feet of water. A couple of miles out to sea there are probably 12,000 feet. Thus the island forms the almost circular top of a very steep and very symmetrical submarine mountain. It is plain that at one period even this summit must have been

submerged, for the whole framework of the island is composed of coral, which occurs as plentifully on the higher levels as on the sea - beach. Moreover, the land appears to be rising, as seems to be shown by the very curious system of terraces, of which the first is formed by the present reef; the next occurs at the height of about 150 feet, and runs all round the island; whilst the top is almost quite flat, and about 250 feet above sea-level. The coast-line is composed for the most part of a wellnigh impenetrable belt of the most curious coral pinnacles, about 30 feet in height, roughly conical, and weathered to the most extraordinary degree of sharpness. I have seen some pinnacles in this belt almost the shape of a church spire, and so sharply pointed that it would be painful to rest the hand heavily on the top. But these pinnacles are of every imaginable shape and size and form, round more than half of the circumference of the island, and form a barrier, only traversed by two native tracks winding round the bases of these conical coral rocks like the paths in a maze, and showing distinct traces of the handiwork of man. Away from these two paths I have often tried to get through this natural barrier, but I have never been successful, and the ruin of my clothes and boots bore testimony to its nature. Above this fringe of pinnacles a gentle slope leads up to the first terrace, and the pinnacles, which are almost as numerous here as in

the lower belt, are packed in a deep layer of pure phosphate. It is not until this is removed by digging that the tops of the coral pinnacles appear. Further excavation, generally by blasting, for an average depth of about 30 feet, brings one down to their basis and to the coral skeleton of the island. This skeleton itself is, however, not solid, but is pierced by countless galleries and caves of unknown extent and, in places, of great depth. I have known 600 feet of fishing-line to be lowered into one cavity without touching any bottom.

From this second terrace rises the final slope to the summit of the island, which is almost flat, the surface consisting of pure phosphate over the same formation of coral pinnacle. All over the island, except in the belt nearest to the reef, the interstices between the pinnacles are filled with phosphate, and in some cases the chemical action which has created this wonderful place has turned what appear to have once been pinnacles of pure coral into pure phosphate. How this all happened, what ages of time have passed since the island first rose from the sea, a bristling mass of coral peaks, since weathered or worn into needle points, by what unnumbered generations of millions of sea-birds the original deposit of guano was made, and by what process that deposit became transformed and solidified into rock phosphate, -all these questions are presented by the physical structure of the island. No satis

factory answer has ever yet been given to them. The phosphate rock now exported from Ocean Island looks like ordinary stone, and must be subjected to the severe action of acids before it releases the fertilising elements which are attributed to its animal origin.

The vegetation of the island is limited to a few varieties of trees, of which the most common is the Callophyllum, Inophyllum, or Ndilo of Fiji. This fine tree grows all over the higher levels of the island, providing grateful shade and abundant firewood for the native population. How such considerable trees could find nourishment upon an island where there is almost no humus, and on which prolonged droughts are of frequent occurrence, always puzzled me, until I came to know of the labyrinth of galleries which honeycomb the island, and in which the natives collected all the water for their needs in the long periods when no rain fell upon the island. These caves or galleries are the exclusive domain of the women, who alone are allowed to enter them. The gateway to each well is fenced about with care, and it is strictly tabu. It was formerly an offence punishable by death for any man to enter it. The women, clothed in the ridi, a kilt made of smoked grass, and carrying a torch made of the dry leaves of the cocoa-nut-palm, crawl into these narrow passages and collect the water, in cocoa-nut-shell bottles, from depressions in the rock, into which it filters from

above. This supply has never been known entirely to fail, though there have been times when it has been very limited indeed. Each family jealously guards its water-supply, and the women water-carriers have had fierce fights as to the ownership of one of these subterranean wells. The water is dark in colour, but perfectly fresh, and strongly impregnated with lime. I have little doubt that the deep roots of the larger trees go down to some of these water-supplies, and that they there find nourishment. Besides these trees, which are useless for food, there are cocoa-nuts, few and starveling, upon the curiously contracted stems of which may be seen the mute evidence of recurring drought, while the swelling of the trunk, which occurs between the droughtrings, bears witness to more kindly seasons.

There is also the Pandanus, with its many varieties, and also a tree which produces excellent almonds, and these provide all the vegetable food of the Ocean islander. His diet consists mainly of pandanus and fish-cocoa-nuts are too rare and valuable to be lightly used, and the almonds are only ripe in their season. As might be expected, necessity has made the natives perhaps the most expert fishermen in the Pacific, and this in spite of the difficulties which the formation of the island offers to the exercise of this craft. The reef is, I think, the worst and most dangerous I have ever seen; the sea is always considerable,

and often tremendous, and the current is strong and treacherous. Yet these people will launch their frail outrigged canoes through a narrow passage in the reef, in an immense breaking sea, and will calmly fish at the very edge of the break of the great rollers without fear, without failure, and without mishap. Fortunately, fish swarm in these waters, and, if nothing better offers, sharks can always be taken. The flying - fish are attracted at night by the light of a torch shown from the bows of a canoe, and caught on the wing in an exaggerated butterflynet. But the most curious form of fishing is one which I never tired of watching during my stay on the island, in which the artist-for, indeed, he is one

walks over the edge of the reef, armed only with a spear, and, diving just outside the break of the sea, spears fish under water, thus matching his activity and quickness against that of the fish in its native element. Many of these fishermen used to wear goggles, like those of motorists. These were most ingeniously made, the glasses chipped out from bottles, and framed in two wooden eye-pieces connected with string across the nose, and bound round the back of the head. I fancy that these goggles are a recent improvement, and that they were suggested by the Japanese, of whom there are now some hundreds on the island. Any one who has ever used a "water telescope" will appreciate the value of the appliance. To