amas was at the height of the rainy
season. Governor Rawson's Report on the Bahamas, 1864, page 92, Appendix
4, gives the annual rainfall at Nassau for ten years, 1855--'64, as
sixty-four inches. From May 1, to November 1 is the wet season, during
which 44.7 inches fall; the other six months 19.3 only. The most is in
October, 8.5 inches.

Andros, the largest island, 1,600 square miles, is the only one that has
a stream of water. The subdivision of the land into so many islands
and keys, the absence of mountains, the showery characteristic of the
rainfall, the porosity of the rock, and the great heat reflected from
the white coral, are the chief causes for the want of running water.
During the rainy season the "abundance of water" collects in the low
places, making ponds and lagoons, that afterward are soaked up by the
rock and evaporated by the sun.

Turk and Watling have lagoons of a more permanent condition, because
they are maintained from the ocean by permeation. The lagoon which
Columbus found at Guanahani had certainly undrinkable water, or he would
have gotten some for his vessels, instead of putting it off until he
reached the third island.

There is nothing in the journal to indicate that the lagoon at Guanahani
was aught but the flooding of the low grounds by excessive rains; and
even if it was one communicating with the ocean, its absence now may be
referred to the effect of those agencies which are working incessantly
to reshape the soft structure of the Bahamas.

Samana has a range of hills on the southwest side about one hundred feet
high, and on the northeast another, lower. Between them, and also along
the north shore, the land is low, and during the season of rains there
is a row of ponds parallel to the shore. On the south side a conspicuous
white bluff looks to the southward and eastward.

The two keys, lying respectively half a mile and three miles east of the
island, and possibly the outer breaker, which is four miles, all might
have been connected with each other, and with the island, four hundred
years ago. In that event the most convenient place for Columbus to
anchor in the strong northeast trade-wind, was where I have put an
anchor on the sub-sketch of Samana.

(In a subsequent passage Admiral Fox says:--)

There is a common belief that the first landing place is settled by
one or another of the authors cited here. Nevertheless, I trust to have
shown, paragraph by paragraph, wherein the