12 Anlmalcular Vhofphorcjcence of Ocean Water. 



fniall as points, and as minute as the eye could difcern. 

 Thefe adhered to our clothes and (kins, and, when taken up 

 with the water in veflels of glafs, were too {mail or too pel- 

 lucid to he diltinguifhed by the naked eve, though they con- 

 tributed eminently towards the eflecl: or this fubmarine illu- 

 mination. This, I prefume, was the nereis nocliluca, an 

 jnteftinal animal. I fuceeeded in diicovering another fpe- 

 cies, which was a (lender worm of about a quarter of an 

 inch lpn'g, and emitted, at times, a bright light of a greenifh 

 hue. This was probably a larger fpecies of nereis. 



Not being well acquainted with the nature of thofe mol- 

 lufca-beings, I apprehended feme inconvenience from fuch a 

 mafs of animal matter left on the fhore to putrefy fo near the 

 houie. But my caufe of alarm vanifhed before the next rilmg 

 fun : for, during the rccefs of the tide, they all perifhed ; 

 though, inftead of remaining a <rreat mafs of dead gelatinous 

 creatures on the beach, this whole collection of living ani- 

 mals, whofe vivid exhibitions of light evinced their being 

 alive near midnight, had fo totally difappeared before four 

 o'clock, that no other trace of their having been there could 

 be difcerned, than fome phofphorefcence in the fand, on 

 being ftirred up by the foot or taken up in the hand. They 

 »had loft their organifation, and, in fo fhort a time, diflblved 

 into a kind of flime, which penetrated the fand, and was 

 mingled with the water of the next flood. On examining 

 the fpots at fix o'clock next morning, before the beach was 

 covered by the tide, not a veftige of one of this numerous 

 fhoal of animals was difcoverable by day-light. A fpeclator 

 of the morning fcene could not have known, bv any thing 

 difcernible, that fuch a brilliant exhibition had been made 

 there the preceding evening, or that a {ingle animal had been 

 caft afhore on the fpot. 



I put feveral of the larger fpecies of thefe creatures into 

 glafTes of their native fait water, and carried them into my 

 chamber. During the night I made repeated obfervations 

 upon them, and found that the light they afforded was neither 

 perpetual nor extended to their whole bodies. It was inter- 

 mitting, and confined to certain lines pairing from one ex- 

 tremity of the creature to another. The light was of a blueiih 

 colour, and the ftreams of it were highly beautiful. Thefe 

 animals lived all night in the water, and were as lively as ever 

 in the morning. They were almofl tranfparent, and nearly 

 of the colour of the fluid in which they were fufpended; yet, 

 on placing them in a good light, they were found fufficiently 

 ppaque to be diftinclly examined. Their figure was globofe, 

 r elliptical, fliaped like a walnut The largeft were; 

 (• about 



