8 HISTORY OF BRITISH ZOOPHYTES. 



British seas, showing that, under Providence, they had played 

 no inferior part in the olden times in the preparation of what 

 was to gratify the taste and to contribute to the comfort and 

 happiness of the inhabitants of our land in the present day. 

 But their place in our seas is now occupied by those tinier 

 tribes which we are to attempt to describe ; zoophytes, as 

 respectable in size and as indefatigable and efficient as the 

 antique, are even now carrying on their mighty operations in 

 the great Pacific Ocean. Our recent British zoophytes have 

 even now, in the Mediterranean Sea, many kindred tribes, 

 wliich afford employment to some thousands of active seamen 

 in collecting their beautiful works, as well as scope for the 

 taste and industry of many neat-handed artificers ashore, by 

 forming the coral into toys for children, as well as beautiful 

 ornaments for the gay and affluent. Mediterranean corals 

 constitute an article of commerce, and are diligently sought 

 for by persons who fit out vessels for the purpose. They 

 are generally branched in the form of shrubs, and they are 

 broken off from the rocks to which they adhere by long 

 hooked poles. When a crop of corals has been obtained 

 from a habitat, they who are engaged in the trade do not 

 visit the same place again for about a dozen years, treating 

 the corals as they would the wood of a forest by land. 



