318 PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY OF THE SEA, AND ITS METEOROLOGY. 



infusoria of Ehrenberg) are very few in number, and mostly frag- 

 mentary. I found, however, some perfect valves of a coscino- 

 discus. The Foraminifera (Polythalamia of Ehrenberg) are very 

 9-are, only one perfect shell being seen, with a few fragments of 

 others. The polycistineee are present, and some species of ha- 

 liomma wore quite perfect. Fragments of other forms of this 

 group indicate that various interesting species might be obtained 

 if we had more of the material. Yoii will see by the abo"^e that 

 this deep sounding differs considerably from those obtained iti 

 the Atlantic, Tlie Atlantic soundings were almost wholly com- 

 posed of calcareous shells of the Foraminifera ; these, on the con- 

 trary, contain very few Foraminifera, and are of a silicious rather 

 than a calcareous nature. This only makes the condition of 

 things in the Northern Atlantic the more interesting." 



589. They belong to the animal, not to the vegetable or mineral king- 

 dom. — The first noticeable thing the microscope gives of these 

 specimens is, that nearly all of them are of the animal, few of the 

 mineral or vegetable kingdom. The ocean teems with life, we 

 know. Of the four elements of the old philosophers — fire, earth, 

 air, and water — perhaps the sea most of all abounds with living 

 creatures. The space occupied on the surface of our planet by 

 the different families of animals and their remains seems to be 

 inversely as the size of the individual. The smaller the animal, 

 the greater the space occupied by its remains. Though not in- 

 variably the case, yet this rule, to a certain extent, is true, and 

 will, therefore, answer our present purposes, which are simply 

 those of illustration. Take the elephant and his remains, or a 

 microscopic animal and his, and compare them. The contrast, 

 as to space occupied, is as striking as the difference between 

 great and small. The graveyard that would hold the remains of 

 the coral insect is larger than the graveyard that would hold 

 those of the elephant. 



590. Quiet reigns in the dejpth of the sea. — We notice another 

 practical bearing in this group of physical facts that Brooke's 

 apparatus has fished up from the bottom of the deep sea. Bailey, 

 with his microscope (§ 587), could detect scarcely a single 

 particle of sand or gravel among these little mites of shells. 

 They were from the great telegraphic plateau (§ 585), and the 

 inference is that there, if anywhere, the waters of the sea are at 

 rest. There was not motion enough to abrade these very delicate 

 organisms, nor current enough to sweep them about and mix up 



