UNKNOWN ISLANDS IN THE PACIFIC.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XXII, Issue 7696, 19 March 1887, Page 6

UNKNOWN ISLANDS IN THE PACIFIC.

The faot that two islands of considerable sizjhave recontlyboen discovered in the Pacific Ocean shows that we hare yet much to leiirn of this great watery expanse. The latest discovery is an island lying less than 100 miles from the northern" coast of New Guinea. It has been named Allison Island, is nearly three miles long, rises from 100 to 160 feet above tho sea, and has abundant timber. Several speoks of fertile and inhabited land, some of them much larger than Allison L-I »nd, huvo beon Found within a few y uars at a distance of one hundred to (■ vo or threo hundred miles from the Now Guinea c/ast, and similar discoveries are made ouce in a while in various parts of tbo Puoilio. Oceanici is so large that no map of it can begiven in an atlas except on a minute scale.- We see hundreds of groups and solitary islands huddled together on the maps and got ihe idea that the Puoifio is tl.icltly studded with verdant bits of land. The faot is, however, that vessels may sail among those islands for many weeks without onoo coming in sight of land. Only a few months ago a crew that had been shipwrecked in the groat island region of the Pacific rowed north for forty days before they readied Hawaii , tlia nearest land. Mr. A. R. \Vi»llaco , : who has travelled wirloly in tho Pacific, ' expr«FSo<l tho opinion some lime ago j that thero aro atill v go id many islanda i there that havojievor yet been seen by white men. j Once in a wliilo a Pacific trader finds j some nuw or little known isknd, and opens trado with its inhabitants, If '

business thrives, ho keeps his secret ns long as he can, so as to enjoy a monopoly It was found a whilcago, when the Woodlark Islands were, explored, . that an Australian firm had otvrefully charted the islands several years before, and had been quietly trading there, oil unknown to tho other Pacific merchants.— 2V. V, Sun.