84 THE CORAL ISLAND. 
ing, living, active flowers, which are identical with our polypes, and 
form quite an analogous world enamelling the ocean-bed. 
On the margin of these islands,—which are generally circular, like a 
ring,—accumulates a layer of vegetable wealth, which speedily grows 
green, and embellishes itself with the only tree that can endure salt- 
water, the cocoa-nut palm. This, then, is the humus; the life which 
will for ever continue to develop. The fresh springs and fountains will 
next make their appearance, invited and fed by the vegetation. 
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Such is the original type of a young world which in due time will 
be inhabited. The cocoa-palm will have its insects; the birds will pause 
on its boughs; men will gather its fruit. Wrecked ships and floating 
timbers, propelled by the sea, will bring there after awhile tenants 
of every kind. 
Some of these islands, when extended, enlarged, and solidified, 
measure not less than twenty-five miles in circumference. Many are 
larger still; fertile, inhabited, and populous, like the Maldives. 
The ambition of their architects might rest contented, you would 
think, with these vast creations. But to insure their fixity, they 
