THE KINGDOM OF THE HELMET 73 



the seascape has become famiHar, and individual fish are 

 known on sight and can be claimed as friends, then is the 

 time to come out late some starlit evening, and go down 

 in the dark. Choose a night when there is strong phosphor- 

 escence, and climb down the ladder very slowly. When 

 your eyes pass just below the level of the water the illu- 

 mination of the ripples is beyond any mere man-made fire. 

 At first, as we stand on the bottom we seem to be in utter 

 darkness, with only a dull glow coming down from above. 

 A glance upward shows the keel of the boat turned to 

 molten silver, and now our eyes have become readapted 

 and our individual cosmos begins to be filled with galaxies 

 and constellations, meteors and comets of blue and white 

 light. These in turn are resolved by our intelligence into 

 definite organisms. Some of them, such as jellyfish and 

 sea-worms, have lights of their own, but most of these 

 shallow water forms are illuminated by proxy. Every move 

 they make evokes brilliance from the minute Noctiluca 

 and other microscopic creatures. Now and then the pas- 

 sage of some great fish lights up all the surrounding reef 

 with its caves and waving fronds, and memory, from our 

 diurnal dives, supplies a host of details. Again language 

 fails us utterly; we can only stand and look and feel and 

 later remember enough of the marvel of it all to wish to 

 experience it again as soon as possible. 



Swinging to the Pacific and to the north, off the shore 

 of Japan, I have found less of intensity of tropical color 

 but more delicate tones, and we realize that many a Nip- 



