of a pin might have been heard at any part of the ship. Some ships avoid
entering the Barrier towards sun-set: this precaution is unnecessary, if
they are sure that the entrance they are approaching is a true one.
Although, outside the Barrier, there are no soundings at a hundred
fathoms, a ship is not twice her own length _inside_ it, before she is
in good anchorage with eighteen to twenty-five fathoms water. There, she
may drop her anchor, and ride in perfect safety till daylight enables
her to pursue her course. Were she to keep outside all night, the
current would drift her to the northward, and compel her to seek a fresh
entrance next day. The Barrier Reef extends from the coast of New
Holland to that of Papua or New Guinea, with numerous gaps or entrances
in it, which appear to be kept open by the current that, for six months
in the year, runs through them from the Pacific to the Indian Seas, and
in the contrary direction during the other six. Notwithstanding this
current, however, I think it extremely probable, that the industrious
coral insect, whose labours never cease within the Tropics, will, sooner
or later, fill up the entire space, close Torres' Straits, and join
those two mighty islands, between which the Barrier Reef, or, more
properly, Reefs, now stand like a line of gigantic stepping-stones. The
gaps in the Reef, in and about the ninth and tenth parallels of south
latitude, are much narrower than those further south, some of them being
not twenty yards wide; which looks as if, agreeably to my theory, the
minute architect had commenced operations on the coast of Papua, and was
gradually working his way southward. What a magnificent line for a
rail-road this Reef will then make, with the boundless Pacific on one
side, and the reefs and islands of the Straits on the other! What a
splendid thoroughfare would this highway form to New Guinea, New
Britain, New Ireland, and the countless islands in their immediate
vicinity! But I shall be thought to be looking _rather too far_ into
futurity.

On our passage from Booby Island to the Java Sea, we passed through the
Straits of Alas, which run between the Islands of Lombak and Sambawa.
The scenery in these straits is very fine. On the left, you have Lombak
Hill, 7000 feet high, sloping gradually from the peak to the sea, and
covered with thick forest. On the right, is the coast of Sambawa,
exhibiting the most extraordinary collection of sugar-loaf hills I ever
sa