WOULD you, my little readers, like to hear about some islands away out in the Atlantic Ocean? There is a very interesting group, called “The Bermudas,” which lie 600 miles directly east of Charleston, S. C., and about 700 miles southeast of New York City, and I want to tell you a little about them.
These islands are coral reefs, built by the little coral insect, upon some mountains under the sea, no doubt, many centuries ago, and have risen up, until, on the larger islands there are hills as much as 265 feet high. There are hundreds of islands in the group, and there are many rocks and reefs surrounding them which lie under the water and make it very dangerous for ships to go near them, except through a winding channel of approach, known only to skilled seamen, who are called pilots, and who go out for many miles—sometimes a hundred or more—to meet in-coming ships and conduct them safely into the harbor.
Of these hundreds of islands, many are very small. There are a few of the principal ones that are separated only by narrow channels of water, which are bridged across, or traveled over by cause-ways and ferries. These larger islands, thus connected, lie something in the shape of a fish-hook, but they curve a little all the way, instead of being straight, as part of the fish-hook is. Following the curve about, the length of the islands is eighteen or nineteen miles; and they vary in width, the body of the islands averaging something over a mile across; the hooked part at the end being considerably narrower. They form a series of hills and vales and are covered with beautiful, semi-tropical verdure.
For two centuries these islands have been in the hands of Great Britain, and strong fortresses are built upon them to hinder any other nation, in time of war, from getting possession. More than a hundred miles of fine roads have been cut out of the coral rocks, and these beautiful roads wind up and down over the hill tops, and in and out through the pretty vales.
ML 03/04/1900