ALASKA INDUSTRIES. 



99 



been able to study the movements of the fur seal in the water to my 

 heart's content; for out and under the water the rocks, to a consider- 

 able distance, are covered with a whitish algoid growth that renders 

 the dark bodies of the swimming seals and sea lions as conspicuous 

 as is the image thrown by a magic lantern of a silhouette on a screen 



'""/> 



Lan Grassy Slats 



LOW Plate iiu - 



LITTLE EASTERN 



Sca-^e; 



prepared for its reception. ^ The low, rocky flats around the pool to 



' The algoid vegetation of the marine shores of these islands is one that adds a 

 peculiar charm and beauty to their treeless, sunless coasts. Every kelp bed that 

 tioats raft-like in Bering Sea or is anchored to its rocky reefs is fairly alive with 

 minute sea shrimps, tiny crabs, and little shells, which cling to its masses of inter- 

 woven fronds or dart in ceaseless motion through, yet within, its interstices. It 

 IS my firm belief that no better base of operations can be found for studying 

 marme mvertebrata than is the post of St. Paul or St. George: the pelagic and 

 the littoral forms are simply abundant beyond all estimation within bounds of 

 reason. The phosphorescence of the waters of Bering Sea surpasses, in continued 

 strength of brilliant illumination, anything that I have seen in southern and 

 equatorial oceans. The crests of the long unbroken line of breakers on Lukannon 

 Beach looked to me, one night in August, like an instantaneous flashing of light- 

 ning, between Tolsti Mees and Lukannon head, as the billows successively rolled 

 in and broke. The seals swimming under the water here, on St. George and 

 beneath the Black Bluffs, streaked their rapid course like comets in the sky, and 

 every time their dark heads popped above the surface of the sea they were marked 

 by a blaze of scintillant light. 



