148 REMINISCENCES OF 



There are few phenomena in nature which have led 

 to a greater diversity of opinion among modern men of 

 science, than the luminous appearance of the ocean dur- 

 ring the night. Some have regarded it as the effect of 

 electricity, produced by the friction of the waves ; others 

 as the product of a species of fermentation in the water, 

 occurring accidentally in certain places. Many have 

 attributed it to the well known phosphorescence of pu- 

 trid fish, or to the decomposition of their slime and 

 exuvia, and a few only to the real cause the voluntary 

 illumination of many distinct species of marine animals, 

 generally analogous to the tribes which were described 

 in the former number of these Reminiscences. Even 

 those authors who have acknowledged the agency of 

 animal life in producing this wonderful appearance, have 

 been in a manner compelled, by its universality, and by 

 the almost incredible multiplication of beings which it 

 infers, to aomit the probable co-operation of other 



My own observation has led to the conclusion, that 

 the phosphoresence of the ocean is due solely to the pe- 

 culiar instinct of the molluscae, and some genera of the 

 Crustacea. 



The electrical hypothesis is certainly fallacious, for 

 were we even to grant the possibility of producing an 

 electric light in an agitated fluid, which is itself an im- 

 perfect conductor, similar to that occasioned by the at- 

 trition of white sugar or glass in the dark, the acknow- 



