SEA-ANEMONES AND CORALS. 15 



understand the long story I have to tell you about these 

 wonderful little animals, who play such an important 

 part in the history of the world. 



We have seen that our little Sea-Anemone is soft 

 throughout, he is just like a mass of jelly, and 

 though the parts of his body are quite distinct, yet his 

 partitions, his tentacles, the walls of his body, and the 

 sac serving him as a stomach are all quite soft ; and he 

 can change his form, contract all his parts, and roll 

 himself up like a little ugly lump, because the whole of 

 his substance is pulpy and gelatinous. But with the 

 Coral it is quite different. It is trufc that when he is 

 first born, he is, as I have described him, a little, oval, 

 jelly-like animal, swimming about in the water ; but 

 after he has selected his resting-place, has grown larger, 

 and his mouth, his stomach, the partitions of his body 

 and his tentacles are formed, then begins a process 

 which ends in giving him a very different character 

 from that of the Anemone. There are hard particles 

 of lime in his substance, and these accumulate, first at 

 the base of the body, where it is attached to the ground, 

 so that it becomes quite firm and solid, then in all the 

 partitions, so that they become like little solid walls, 

 and in the sides of the body, so that they too grow 

 quite hard ; and now the whole has a solid frame, the 

 only parts of the little creature which remain soft being 

 the summit, the mouth, th^ fringes around it, and the 

 stomach within. 



I have said that the coral animals grow in clusters, 

 but thus far I have only described the single animal that 

 begins the coral stock. Now I will show you how he 

 multiplies himself, till, instead of one animal, there are 



