giant structure; at one place, appearing like colossal Druidical stones; at another, entangled together like the rude materials of some Cyclopean edifice, or else suspended, and so slightly poised that a breath of air seems sufficient to overthrow them."* More than fifty distinct and detached rocks and islets can then be counted, although most of those seen at high water have become merged into a single island.

A good deal of business is done on the Chaussey Islands. Besides the farmers and farm labourers, and those engaged on the government works, there is a mixed population of stone cutters, fishermen and barilla-collectors. Of these, the fishermen are the most important, and as many as seven or eight families of them are established on a small headland close to the Sound. Their habitations are primitive, consisting of huts, enclosed only by rough walls three or four feet high, the stones cemented by the mud or oaze of the Sound. The roofs of these huts are the remains of old boats turned upside down. In each of such miserable dwellings, ten or twelve feet long and not quite so wide, sleeps a whole family, consisting often of father, mother, sons, daughters, nephews and nieces, besides occasional friends from the main land, attracted by the prospect of a day's fishing. The principal fish caught, is, however, no fish at all, but lobsters, of which each family is estimated to take annually from eight to nine thousand. They are sold at Coutances and thence conveyed to Paris.

Besides the lobster fishing, shrimping is carried on by many of the women, who may be seen with their nets on their shoulders, following the indentations of the shore, and searching carefully for their prey, under stones and rocks, and in little pools. This is, of course, only possible when the tide is out. M. de Quatrefages, in the book already quoted, states, that at the time of his visit, as much as two and a-half tons weight of "Rambles of a Naturalist," by A. de Quatrefages, translated by E. C. Otté, vol. i., p.

17.

MIGRATORY POPULATION.

129

shrimps were annually obtained from the islands, and that the greater part of this large supply was conveyed to Paris.

The stone cutters are the most numerous of the three classes of Chaussey inhabitants. The material they work on is a pale blue granite, very hard, tough and durable. It is used not only in the neighbourhood, and at Granville and St. Malo, but is carried into the interior of France. Most of the quarry men are

Bretons and live in wooden barracks.

The sea-weed on the rocks round Chaussey is largely used in the manufacture of barilla, and supplies employment to an important section of the population. The fucus is stripped from the rocks at low water, and collected into large masses, which, when the tide rises, are floated away as rafts to some convenient spot, whence at the next turn of the tide they are brought out of the reach of the waves, and scattered over the sands to dry. When dry, the whole is burnt, and the ashes melted in a small kiln. The produce in this state is the barilla of commerce.

The population of the Grande Ile is somewhat migratory. As the winter comes on, the barilla collectors are the first to depart-then the quarry men gradually drop away, and lastly the fishermen give up their occupation, leaving only a few farm labourers as tenants of these storm-beaten shreds of land, during the short days and the long and dreary nights of winter.

In former times these islands were more peopled, and were peopled by a different class than they are at present. Their name, like that of most of the other Channel Islands, denotes that they were known to, if not occupied by, the Northmen. An abbey, or religious house of some extent, was established on the Grande Ile at an early period, and the island was then the resort of hermits. The abbey dates from the time of Richard, the first Duke of Normandy, and it was dependant on that of Mont St. Michel. After various changes, it was passed,

* Fucus nodosus, F. vesiculosus, and F. serratus are the three kinds of vraic that yield the chief supply.

K

in 1343, from the hands of the Benedictines to those of the Cordeliers, by Philip de Valois, then King of France. For two centuries it continued of some importance as an educational institution, the registry of the see of Coutances showing that three or four candidates were sent thence, on several occasions, for ordination. Subsequently, during the wars with England, the abbey was pillaged, and it was finally abandoned in 1543, after which, for a century, there would seem to have been no inhabitants except a few small proprietors who may have earned a scanty subsistence, but were too poor to tempt pirates. At the time of the French Revolution, the ownership was made over to the state, but it has since passed into private hands.

Several of the smaller of the Chaussey Islands are named, and some are very interesting to the naturalist. They are separated from neighbouring rocks and islets by narrow and deep valleys, with precipitous rocks on each side; and at low spring tides they are so rich in marine zoology, as to rival even the caverns of Sark. These have been admirably described in the work by M. de Quatrefages, already referred to, and the reader may turn with pleasure to "The Rambles of a Naturalist," for an account at once accurate and popular of those marvellous productions of the animal kingdom, with which the rocky shores of all the Channel Islands especially abound.

Till lately, the only public building on the Chaussey archipelago, was a light-house, the light from which is visible fifteen miles at sea, being at an elevation of 120 feet. For some time past there has been much activity shown in constructing, near the light-house, a fort of some strength, which will render the adjacent harbour, also in course of construction, perfectly safe from attack. It is not easy to imagine, that any evil can result to the larger islands of the Channel group, or to English interests, from the conversion of Chaussey into a stronghold. The position of this little archipelago in the deepest recess of the great bay formed by the coasts of Britany and

Normandy, no doubt enables a fortress placed there to command the approach to the adjacent land; but the peculiar run of the tide, the vast extent of sand at low water, and the innumerable rocks further out at sea, are natural defences, superior to any that can be placed there by man. The English certainly ought not to complain because their neighbours endeavour to make the most of the very few and small advantages they possess in these islands, when we consider the far greater importance and accessibility of the British possessions in the Channel. Alderney is not further from the French coast than the 'Grande Ile' of Chaussey; but the one island is so placed as to command a great and wide channel through which a large proportion of the whole commerce of the world must pass, while the other is only approached by a few small and unimportant vessels, for it leads nowhere, and can threaten nothing.

The subjoined illustration represents an abandoned ship laden with teak, wrecked in the Channel and seen drifting towards the Douvres rocks, in the winter of 1861.

CHAPTER VII.

CLIMATE AND METEOROLOGY OF THE ISLANDS, AND THEIR SANITARY CONDITION.

THE geographical position of the Channel Islands indicates at once to the physical geographer, the peculiarities that are likely to be presented in their climate, and in the meteorological phenomena to which they are subjected. Placed near the western extremity of the European continent in a wide channel, communicating without interruption with an open ocean; situated not far from the main land, but within the influence of a group of much larger islands; enclosed within a large bay, of which a part of the group forms one of the horns, and whose form greatly influences the tidal wave-these conditions suggest causes of local climate, well worthy of consideration, and all pointing to one conclusion.

In the first place it must be mentioned as an ascertained fact, that near as the islands are to each other, to France and to England, their climates are in essential points distinct and local, and need separate consideration. We should, therefore, consider the peculiarities of one typical island, and then compare this with the others.

Guernsey, from its position as the outlying island-the most completely in the centre of the Channel-the furthest removed from land-of medium size and of medium elevation, compared