In the Society Archipelago, on the other
hand, where the lagoon-channels are almost choked up, where much
low alluvial land has accumulated, and where in some cases long
islets have been formed on the barrier-reefs--facts all showing
that the islands have not very lately subsided--only feeble shocks
are most rarely felt. In these coral formations, where the land and
water seem struggling for mastery, it must be ever difficult to
decide between the effects of a change in the set of the tides and
of a slight subsidence: that many of these reefs and atolls are
subject to changes of some kind is certain; on some atolls the
islets appear to have increased greatly within a late period; on
others they have been partially or wholly washed away. The
inhabitants of parts of the Maldiva Archipelago know the date of
the first formation of some islets; in other parts the corals are
now flourishing on water-washed reefs, where holes made for graves
attest the former existence of inhabited land. It is difficult to
believe in frequent changes in the tidal currents of an open ocean;
whereas we have in the earthquakes recorded by the natives on some
atolls, and in the great fissures observed on other atolls, plain
evidence of changes and disturbances in progress in the
subterranean regions.
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