094 THE INHABITANTS OF THE Sia. 
flourishing amidst those great breakers of the western ocean, 
which no mass of rock, let it be ever so hard, can long resist. 
The stem is round, slimy, and smooth, and seldom has a 
diameter of so much as an inch. A few taken together are 
sufficiently strong to support the weight of the large loose 
stones to which in the inland channels they grow attached ; 
and some of these stones are so heavy, that when drawn to 
the surface they can scarcely be lifted into a boat by one 
person.” 
** Captain Cook, in his second voyage says, that ‘at Kerguelen’s 
Land some of this weed is of most enormous length, though the 
stem is not much thicker than a man’s thumb. I have men- 
tioned that, on some of these shoals on which it grows, we did 
not strike ground with a line of twenty-four fathoms; the 
depth of water, therefore, must have been greater. And as this 
weed does not grow in a perpendicular direction, but makes a 
very acute angle with the bottom, and much of it afterwards 
spreads many fathoms on the surface of the sea, I am well 
warranted to say that some of it grows to the length of sixty 
fathoms and upwards.’ 
“Certainly at the Falkland Islands, and about Tierra del 
Fuego, extensive beds frequently spring up from ten and fifteen 
fathoms water. I do not suppuse the stem of any other plant 
attains so great a length as 360 feet, as stated by Captain Cook. 
Its geographical range is very considerable; it is found from the 
extreme southern islets near Cape Horn, as far north on the 
eastern coast as lat. 43°, and on the western it was tolerably 
abundant, but far from luxuriant, at Chiloe, in lat. 42% It 
may possibly extend a little further northward, but is soon 
succeeded by a different species. 
“We thus have a range of 15° in latitude, and as Cook. who 
must have been well acquainted with the species, found it at 
Kerguelen’s Land, no less than 140° in longitude. 
“The number of living creatures, of all orders, whose existence 
intimately depends on the kelp, is wonderful. A large volume 
might be written, describing the inhabitants of one of these beds 
of sea-weed. Almost every leaf, except those that float on the 
surface, is so thickly incrusted with corallines as to be of a white 
colour. We find exquisitely delicate structures, some inhabited 
by simple hydra-like polypi, others by more organised kinds 
