Note 90 — Chapter IX · SECONDARY ROCKS. 3. The Oolite proper.

“So vast an expanse!” Mr. Darwin traced coral reefs in the Pacific, 4,000 miles long and 600 broad. Between the coasts of Malabar and Madagascar there is a chain of coral reefs, called the Maldives and Laccadives, 480 miles long and 50 miles wide. On the east coast of Australia there is an unbroken reef of 350 miles long; and between Australia and Guinea, coral reefs extend 700 miles in length. Truly the coral animals, like the “conies,” are a “feeble folk,” but their habitations survive our proudest monuments.