178 WESTERN SERIES OF READERS. 



for the man who rowed us about. We each gave 

 him twenty-five cents and took our places in the 

 boat. Then we all looked into the boxes, and 

 found, to our delight, that we could see the bottom 

 as clearly as if we had been fishes ourselves. 



The place was a quiet spot in Monterey Bay, 

 where the bottom was partly rocky and partly 

 sandy, and the cool ocean water was as clear as 

 glass. Looking over the side of the boat, we 

 could see little but ripples, but when we bent over 

 the water-telescopes, it seemed as if we were right 

 at home with the creatures of the ocean. 



The seaweeds first attracted our attention. They 

 were growing gracefully upon the rocks, some of 

 them being bright green, like leaves of lettuce, 

 while others were of an olive color, tall and 

 branched, and looking almost like trees. 



Some of them are, indeed, called sea-oaks, and 

 they grow in water that is twenty feet deep, reach- 

 ing from the bottom almost to the surface. Then 

 there were fields of seagrass as green as that of 

 the freshest lawn on the land. 



This grass was a yard high or more, and we 

 thought what a swath we could cut if we could 

 only go down into the sea with a scythe. On this 

 grass live many little animals, just as you see 

 flies, and bugs, and spiders on the grass of a hay- 

 field. 



