GROWTH OF CORALS. 371 
says Professor Dana, “are well known; and although not emu- 
lating in size the oaks of our forests—for they do not exceed 
six or eight feet in height—they are gracefully branched, and 
the whole surface blooms with coral polyps in place of leaves 
and flowers. Shrubbery, tufts of rushes, beds of pinks, and 
feathery mosses, are most exactly imitated. Many species spread 
vut in broad leaves or folia, and resemble some large-leaved plant 
just unfolding; when alive, the surface of each leaf is covered 
with polyp-flowers. The cactus, the lichen clinging to the rock, 
and the fungus in all its varieties, have their numerous repre- 
sentatives. Besides these forms imitating vegetation, there are 
gracefully modelled vases, some of which are three or four feet 
in diameter, made up of a network of branches and branchlets, 
and sprigs of flowers. There are also solid coral hemispheres 
like domes among the vases and shrubbery, occasionally ten 
or even twenty feet in diameter, whose symmetrical surface is 
gorgeously decked with polyp-stars of purple and emerald- 
green.” 
Under such aspects appear the living organisms whose com- 
bined efforts have mainly constructed those reefs and islands of 
coral origin which now lie scattered far and wide over the 
surface of the equatorial ocean. Words are inadequate to ex- 
press the splendour of the submarine gardens with which the 
lithophytes clothe the rocky shores of the tropical seas. 
“There are few things more beautiful to look at,” says Captain 
Basil Hall, ‘‘ than these corallines when viewed through two or 
three fathoms of clear and still water. It is hardly an exag- 
geration to assert that the colours of the rainbow are put to 
shame on a bright sunny day by what meets the view on 
looking into the sea in those fairy regions.” And Ehrenberg 
was so struck with the magnificent spectacle presented by the 
living polyparia in the Red Sea that he exclaimed with enthu- 
siasm, ‘‘ Where is the paradise of flowers that can rival, in 
variety and beauty, these living wonders of the ocean !” 
Besides the charms of their own growth, the tropical coral 
gardens afford a refuge or a dwelling-place to numberless 
animals clothed in gorgeous apparel. Fishes attired in azure, 
scarlet, and gold, crustaceans, sea-urchins, sea-stars, sea ane- 
mones, annelides, of a brilliancy of colour unknown in the 
northern seas, glide or swim along through their tangled 
