Channel Islands

“ The commercial growth of the Channel Islands has been [Pg 14] divided into five periods, those of fishing, knitting (the age of the garments known as "jerseys" and "guernseys") , privateering, smuggling, and agriculture and commerce. To the third period belong these records. The prosperity of the islands was greatest from the middle of the seventeenth century up to the overthrow of Napoleon at Waterloo and the close of Canada's successful fight against invasion in 1815. ”

“ In the matter of hours of sunshine the islands come out a long way ahead of even Devon and Cornwall, as statistics show that for every hundred hours these counties can boast of bright sunshine, the Channel Islands can show nearly one hundred and forty. ”

“ Peter's Church, Guernsey, on New Year's Day, Alexander Ducas, of Jethou, to Jeanette Graviot, of Herm.
[Pg 271]
APPENDIX. A FEW WORDS ABOUT THE CHANNEL ISLES.
To say that the Channel Islands are not known to the general public would be to say what is in these modern days of advertising untrue; but it may be doubted if they are so well known as they really deserve. They might very well be called the "Multum in Parvo Islands," for they contain a very great deal of beauty in a small space ”

“ Nothing is here said about the Isle of Man or the Channel Islands, because it would, no doubt, be considered absurd to advise anyone to visit those islands whose main object was the acquisition of mountaineering skill. Pretty as the former island is, its hills are nothing more than hills, except where they are also railways or tea gardens; and even on its cliffs, which are especially fine at the southern end, comparatively little climbing will be found. ”

“ From the harbor of Portland we will make a steamer-excursion almost across the English Channel, going about one hundred and fifteen miles to the Channel Islands, off the north-western coast of France and within a few miles of the shores of Normandy and Brittany. They are Jersey, Guernsey, Alderney, and Sark, standing in a picturesque situation, with a mild climate and fertile soil, and devoted mainly to dairying and to fishing. ”

“ Peter Port is an admirable centre from which to visit every quarter of the compact little island; but, indeed, as already adumbrated, there is but little in Guernsey (except for the antiquarian) that is really worth seeing outside its capital, except the south coast. St. Sampson's may be visited for its picturesque church, which is one of the oldest and most interesting on the island. The road by which we gain it is so ugly—one continued line of houses—that no one need hesitate to use the electric tram, which was one of the earliest of its kind in the British dominions. ”

“ The inhabited Overseas Territories, along with England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, the Channel Islands, and the Isle of Man constitute the family of British nations.
European South Atlantic/American Territories
Apart from the numerous British islands, European territories in the region of South Atlantic and South America are also the Norwegian Antarctic island of Bouvetøya (Bouvet Island) , and the French overseas department of French Guiana (home to the European Spaceport in Kourou) on the South American mainland. ”

“ There is also a little granite-quarrying, and seaweed-burning employs many.
None of the islands is mountainous, and the fine scenery for which they are famous is almost wholly coastal. In this respect each main island has certain distinctive characteristics. Bold cliffs are found on the south of Alderney; in Guernsey they alternate with lovely bays; Sark is specially noted for its magnificent sea-caves, while the coast scenery of Jersey is on the whole more gentle than the rest. ”

“ Christmas Day in the year 182- was somewhat remarkable in the island of Guernsey. Snow fell on that day. In the Channel Islands a frosty winter is uncommon, and a fall of snow is an event. ”

“ I know all the coast running from Monterey right to Cape St. Lucas. I had a tenth share in a shark boat once, and I’ve nosed into all the cricks and corners right to the end of Lower California, and I’ve got a feeling that the Dutchman’s using the Channel Islands and that we’ll fetch him somewhere about there, if we’re clever. ”

“ Looking southward from Mont Orgueil at low tide it is possible to realize the extraordinary difficulties that attend the navigation of the Jersey seas. The coast from this point to St. Aubin is flat, but as far as eye can see the surface of the water is a vast archipelago of broken rocks and reefs. Still farther out to sea is the hardly submerged plateau of the Minquiers, with here and there a point that just lifts above high water. There is a second stretch of low sandy coast on the west of the island, at St. Ouen's Bay, guarded in its turn by a second reef of rocks. ”

“ A book which will long remain the standard authority on the subject. No one who has been to the Channel Islands, or who purposes going there will be insensible of its value."—Saturday Review.
"It is the produce of many hands and every hand a good one." ”

“ The strength of Alderney, however, lies chiefly in its west and south coasts; no one would visit the island except to visit these, or unless one happened to be an enthusiast for the world's neglected and inaccessible spots. I do not know how far the barbarous quarrying that was projected some six or seven years ago on the south side of the island has since been carried out, or how far it has injured the amenities of the coast. Anyhow, the Two Sisters, towards the south-west corner of the island, are hardly to be rivalled in their splintered grandeur, even in Jersey or Sark. ”

“ Leading from Skidegate Channel to the Pacific ocean, between Moresby and Cha-thl islands, is eight miles in length, and from two to three hundred feet to two miles in width. Passing through it at half-tide our canoe grounded in several places. It was formerly much traversed by the natives inhabiting the abandoned village of Cha-thl, on its north shore, near the west coast entrance, and also by the Gold Harbour people before their removal to Maud Island. There are several hundred acres of grazing lands on the sides and tops of the mountains lying to the southward. ”

“ The interior of Jersey is no doubt pleasant, with its lush-green valleys running north and south, with its quiet little villages, and with its never-ending potato-fields. The interior of Guernsey, on the other hand, is frankly hideous, save here and there a cottage, or a picturesque old farm, hidden in the folding of some safely secluded dell. But in both cases alike the real distinction of the island is limited to cliffs that for warmth of colour and strangeness of contortion can surely be paralleled in Cornwall alone. Sark, on the contrary, is almost wholly coast ”

“ The wide fringe of islands to the westward practically ends at Fullerton, so that a ship making the coast may know the position by the presence or absence of islands; but as the islands are very low it is hard to distinguish them from the mainland at a safe distance away, as the shoals and reefs extend more than five miles beyond the harbour. The surveys made in the spring of 1904 show that a fairly safe channel will be found by keeping well to the eastward of the harbour, and by then following a northwest course, keeping in line the beacons on a small island about a mile outside the harbour. ”

“ There are frequently large quantities of ice in the neighbourhood of Big island, with at times considerable pressure; on this account ships should not approach close to the island. From Big island the course should be so laid that the ship may pass a few miles to the northward of Charles island, and from there the middle channel should be followed to pass between Nottingham island and Cape Wolstenholme. ”

“ Some of the atolls, in the larger archipelagoes, stand so near to each other, and have such an evident relationship in form, that they compose little sub-groups: in the Caroline Archipelago, one such sub-group consists of Pouynipete, a lofty island encircled by a barrier-reef, and separated by a channel only four miles and a half wide from Andeema atoll, with a second atoll a little further off. In all these respects an examination of a series of charts will show how perfectly groups of atolls resemble groups of common islands. ”

“ Here, as in Whitsunday Island, the whole of that part of the reef which is visible is converted into land. This is a circumstance of rare occurrence; more usually a snow-white line of great breakers, with here and there an islet crowned by cocoa-nut trees, separates the smooth waters of the lagoon-like channel from the waves of the open sea. The barrier-reefs of Australia and of New Caledonia, owing to their enormous dimensions, have excited much attention: in structure and form they resemble those encircling many of the smaller islands in the Pacific Ocean. ”

“ These regions, as they become more known, may even invite the attention of tourists by their sublime scenery. Staten Island to the east of Tierra del Fuego has been settled by the Argentine government; there are a prison and lighthouse at St John Harbour, and a first-class permanent meteorological and magnetic station.
The division of the archipelago to the south of Beagle Channel includes the islands of Hoste, Navarin, Gordon, Londonderry, Stewart, Wollaston and numerous islets, disposed in triangular form with the base on Beagle Channel and the apex at the rocky headland of Cape Horn. ”

“ In the middle of the fourteenth century the island was inhabited by a crew of lawless wreckers, who were a menace to the navigation of the whole Manche. The merchants of Rye and Winchelsea then put their heads together, and agreed to do by subtlety what they could not effect by force. Landing on Sark with an armed force must well-nigh have been impossible, till Helier de Carteret cut his tunnel through the rocks, when he colonized the island in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. ”

“ The island is bounded on the north by Lancaster sound and on the east by Prince Regent inlet, Fury and Hecla strait and Fox channel. As Archæan crystalline rocks occupy the greater part of the island, the Silurian limestones being almost confined to the western side, the coast is very irregular, and is indented by deep bays, especially along the east and north sides. The larger ones on the eastern side, passing northward, are Frobisher bay, Cumberland gulf, Exeter sound, Home bay, Clyde river, Scott inlet, and Ponds inlet, together with many more of considerable size and length. ”

“ Quite a list of plants might here be appended to shew the degree of mildness experienced in the Channel Islands. Many of them, although of tropical growth, standing out of doors all the winter without taking harm. Dr. Greenhow, of Edinburgh, while staying in Jersey one winter, remarks in a letter to a friend dated January 21st, "I have now on a table before me in full bloom, the following flowers—narcissus, jonquils, stocks, wallflowers, rosemary, myrtle, polyanthus, mignonette, and hyacinths." ”

“ Meat of all kinds is a trifle dearer per pound than in England; but when it is taken into consideration that the Channel Islands' pound is about seventeen and three-quarter ounces of our avoirdupois weight, there is little, if any difference in the prices. Fruit and fish are remarkably good and cheap. The produce in the markets of Guernsey and Jersey are an unusual sight to visitors, for the fruit is placed for customers' inspection just as it is gathered, so that the plums, grapes, etc., retain their bloom and look a perfect picture. ”

“ The writer has travelled over most of the island on foot to explore its twelve old churches, and investigate its coast. Frankly, he is driven to put on record that he found it a dismal task. Features, of course, remain of interest and beauty, if one is willing to walk about in blinkers, and seldom raise one's eyes above the ground. The old, granite-built farmhouses, standing back, as a rule, but a little from the road, are uncommon, and extremely picturesque. Inland Guernsey, again, possesses one single glory that is almost unknown in Jersey. ”

“ These Channel Island dolmens are of wholly different type from the familiar cromlechs of the mushroom pattern of Kits Coty House, near Aylesford, or of Pentre Evan, in Pembrokeshire. They are, in fact, considerable, stone-built, subterranean burial-chambers, with traces in some instances of a long succession of interments. The islanders call them "pouquelayes"; which is derived by Miss Carey from either the Celtic pwca, a fairy, and lies, a place, or from pouq, an excavation, and lekh, a stone. ”

“ Each of the ship’s boats is in charge of an officer, who always attends to the steering. The ‘boat-steerers’ are in reality the harpooners, and have nothing to do with the steering of the boat.
Towards the end of June the boats cross through the floating ice to Southampton island, where they remain until compelled to return for fresh supplies, usually about three weeks. A second trip to that island is sometimes made, and in August the ship, now free from the ice, is taken to Repulse bay or the Frozen strait connecting it with Fox channel. ”

“ The only spot where I have noticed it growing in profusion in the larger island was on the prehistoric "hougue" at Prince's Tower.
Guernsey, however, though thus irritatingly spoilt in its interior—for the visitor comes to see beautiful scenery, and not to assist at a horticultural triumph—still possesses in its south coast a feature of distinction that neither recklessness nor greed of money has so far been able to spoil. It also possesses in St. ”

“ An island, about a mile in length, lies across the entrance in a north-westerly direction, which so thoroughly protects the inner waters of the inlet from westerly storms, that I have called it Protection Island.* There is a canoe passage between it and a point of rocks projecting from the southern shore of the inlet, and a small island close to its south-west side. Three streams flow into the inlet—one at its head, called Athlow river, and two on its south side, the largest, from forty to fifty feet in width, rising in Sook Lake. ”