18 



WEST COAST SHELLS 



Fig. 8. X 3 (*) 



small brachiopod, which has been 

 dredged from deep water at vari- 

 ous stations along the coast. Fig- 

 ure 8 shows several views of this 

 little shell, which is thin, trans- 

 lucent, and of a yellowish-gray 

 color. 



It is hard for us, who live in 

 the air and the bright sunshine, to 

 imagine the conditions at the bot- 

 tom of the ocean, where these 

 creatures have their home. In the 

 first place, it is very cold down 

 there, the temperature of the 

 water being but little above the freezing point. This 

 has been proved by sinking self-registering ther- 

 mometers and pulling them up again. It is very 

 dark, too, for how can much light struggle down 

 through thousands of feet of water, even if it is 

 remarkably clear. There is but little motion, for 

 the swell of the waves is all far above, and the slow 

 drift of ocean currents makes but little impression 

 on the oozy bed of the sea. Dark, cold, still, with- 

 out morning or noon, only a gloomy night; how 

 dismal it seems to us who live on the merry sur- 

 face of the earth. And yet, countless generations 

 of these quiet creatures have apparently lived in 

 comfort down in the depths of the sea. Verily, the 

 study of any kind of life ought to broaden and 

 deepen our ideas of the actual and the possible, and 

 to show us that our mode of living, splendid though 



