Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1885-07-18
Gales aud Sketthts.
Bermuda's Peculiarities.
NEITHER Soil Nor WATER, ANIMALS
Nor BIRDS, ONLY CORAL.

In no other part of the world. think,
did nature show such supreme niggardil-
ness as here. She gave the Bermudas
neither soil nor water. neither animal nor
bird, neither fruit. vegetable nor flower.
She simply conferred the most delightful
weather under the canopy. and then stood
off and said ..Su.h weather as that is a
bountiful outfit, if you don't get another
thing" So it has proved. 10 the prize
weather all other things have been added
by visitors The only wild animal known
here are the rat and the mouse. brought
by vessels; the casual and oleagnous
whale, and the bat, that has blown across
the Atlantic by accident. There is no
game whatever and never has been. OF
birds. the splendid cardinal of the tropics
is here. The blue robin of New England
| is here. piping as bravely as ever The
eat-bird has put in an appearance. and so
has that even greater nuisance, the English
sparrow 1.-The pirate of the winged world.
| Two Spanish birds, the "chick OF the viii
| lage' and the pretty ground dove, move
quietly about. And that is all. Not a
native bird among them.
| have said that nature gave Bermuda
no soil. Ignatius Donnelly thinks that
these islands and the Azores are the re-
mains of Plato's tabled continent-the
last lot remaining above the sea after the
great cataclysm of one hundred thousand
years ago buried the rest of the continent
with its splendid civilizations forever.
In that case. should suppose there would
be some real soil, some rocks, some drift
some sand, some clay, some alluvium,
some vegetable mold. There is very
little of the last and not bit of any of the
others on these islands. There is not
clay enough for a pipe, or sand enough
for sand glass, or a stone big or
little nearer than the coast of Georgia.
There is nothing here but ground coral
reefs. carbonate of lime. digested and de-
posted by that mucilaginous and shapeless
creature called the coral insect This
island is as white as so much chalk. and
about as barren. Water soaks into it like
a sponge, and five minutes after sharp
shower one can 90 out walking and find
neither mud nor moisture anywhere. On
some lowlands this comminuted coral,
with the mixture of elements it has taken
up, is not as hard as elsewhere; and here
it is occasionally cultivated by the admix-
ture with the soil of large quantity of
fertilizers from America. 1t can absorb
unlimited cargoes of these stmuants
without having its life much stirred by
them. Tickle this coral reef with a hoe
ever so vigorously, it never laughs with
harvest; and after you have poured into
it oceans of poudrette and dosed it with
loan and bound policies of warm ground
upon its stomach, it only smiles faint
and CHASTITY smile. But. under these cir
OH O for
and lily bulbs are planted. and, if they
can clasp rootlets around anything softer
than castiron stove lid, they grow
Some things grow in warm climate
without much encouragement. saw this |
week tamarind tree as large asa good
sized New England elm, That had been
torn up by hurricane long ago, and stood
on its very top, its roots pointing toward
the sky. The branches that stuck into the
ground put forth roots and gave the wreck
a new anchorage, while the upthrown
roots reverted and set forth new limbs.
and the dense mass of foliage now shades
the ground, and invites the still fruitful
giant to forget its disaster.
There is no fresh water on the island ex-
cept what comes direct from the clouds
The sky is the cistern of Bermuda. The
houses are all built of the coral that is
quarried in beautiful white cubes from the
ground anywhere, seeming fit for the
sculptor's chisel then every house is
rooted with slant roof of the same and
furnished with abundant tanks. In these
the rain is gathered; and the tanks are so
very clean, and the roof is so very white
and the air so very free from dust that the
water is the purest in the world-cold and
pellucid as if drawn from the choicest
mountain spring. never saw such deli
cious water anywhere. Nature knew what
she was about when she omitted the Bur-
mudiau springs.-COr. Cincinnati COM
mercidL Gazette.