ALMOST ISLAND 



they shut out reef and sand, many of them almost 

 within arm's reach — milhng around and around 

 me, apparently absorbed in interest in this being 

 new to their cosmos. After several minutes another 

 idea imbued the thousands, and as one fish, they 

 turned and swam unhurriedly out and around 

 the end of the reef. Five minutes passed before I 

 began my ascent; the experience was too wonder- 

 ful, the memory too vivid, to be immediately 

 disturbed. 



I am amused to find that I have described the in- 

 habitants of my island as living on sand or reef, 

 ,and omitted the water itself where the vast majority 

 spend their lifetime. At certain seasons creatures 

 appear who have nothing whatever to do with coral, 

 reef or sand. In September, when flocks of shore 

 birds migrate to the beaches of Nonsuch, schools, or 

 more properly, sheer hosts of individual creatures 

 far different swim into my ken; the passing, day 

 after day, of great sun-jellies. They are so evanes- 

 cent when viewed from below that I often detect 

 them first by their shadows pulsating unevenly over 

 the sand furrows — shadows which seem to possess 

 more substance than their makers. When I am mak- 

 ing my way with my arrows across a wide stretch of 

 sand I sometimes leap up efght or ten feet and im- 

 pale one of these great living plaques, thrusting my 

 lance through and through the creature, a subma- 

 rine pigsticking of sorts. It is a tribute to the 

 simplicity of the nervous system of jellies that they 

 appear to be quite unaware that anything untoward 



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