Chapter 8 - Page 2

summit--the bottom of the cup, if you like--is about three hundred
feet above the level of the sea, and its flanks, which are steep and
regular, are as bare as the sea-washed rocks at its base.

There is another peculiarity about it which must render the islet
easily recognizable by mariners approaching it from the west, and this
is a rock which forms a natural arch at the base of the mountain--the
handle of the cup, so to speak--and through which the waves wash as
freely as the sunshine passes. Seen this way the islet fully justifies
the name of Back Cup given to it.

Well, I know and recognize this islet! It is situated at the extremity
of the archipelago of the Bermudas. It is the "reversed cup" that I
had occasion to visit a few years ago--No, I am not mistaken. I then
climbed over the calcareous and crooked rocks at its base on the east
side. Yes, it is Back Cup, sure enough!

Had I been less self-possessed I might have uttered an exclamation
of surprise--and satisfaction--which, with good reason, would have
excited the attention and suspicion of the Count d'Artigas.

These are the circumstances under which I came to explore Back Cup
while on a visit to Bermuda.

This archipelago, which is situated about seven hundred and fifty
miles from North Carolina is composed of several hundred islands or
islets. Its centre is crossed by the sixty-fourth meridian and the
thirty-second parallel. Since the Englishman Lomer was shipwrecked
and cast up there in 1609, the Bermudas have belonged to the United
Kingdom, and in consequence the colonial population has increased to
ten thousand inhabitants. It was not for its productions of cotton,
coffee, indigo, and arrowroot that England annexed the group--seized
it, one might say; but because it formed a splendid maritime station
in that part of the Ocean, and in proximity to the United States of
America. Possession was taken of it without any protest on the part of
other powers, and Bermuda is now administered by a British governor
with the addition of a council and a General Assembly.

The principal islands of the archipelago are called St. David,
Somerset, Hamilton, and St. George. The latter has a free port, and
the town of the same name is also the capital of the group.

The largest of these isles is not more than seventeen miles long and
five wide. Leaving out the medium-sized ones, there remains but an
agglomeration of islets and reefs scattered over an area of twelve
square leagues.

Although the climate of Bermuda is very healthy, very salubrious, the
isles are nevertheless frightfully beaten by the heavy winter tempests
of the Atlantic, and their approach by navigators presents certain
difficulties.

What the