SEPTEMBER. 283 



innumerable, and the majesty of the mighty waters 

 lends an interest unknown to an inland landscape. 

 The loneliness too of the sea-shore is much cheered 

 by the constant changes arising from the ebb and 

 flow of the tide, and the undulations of the water's 

 surface, sometimes rolling like mountains, and 

 again scarcely murmuring on the beach. As you 

 gather there 



Each flower of the rock and each gem of the billow, 



you may feel with the poet, that there are joys in 

 solitude, and that there are pleasures to be found in 

 the investigation of nature of the most powerful and 

 pleasing influence. 



There is a pleasure in the pathless woods ; 

 There is a rapture on the lonely shore ; 

 There is society where none intrudes 

 By the deep sea, and music in its roar. 



But nothing can be more beautiful than a view 

 of the bottom of the ocean, during a calm, even 

 round our own shores, but particularly in tropical 

 climates, especially when it consists alternately of 

 beds of sand and masses of rock. The water is 

 frequently so clear and undisturbed, that, at great 

 depths, the minutest objects are visible ; groves of 

 coral are seen expanding their variously-coloured 

 clumps, some rigid and immoveable, and others 

 waving gracefully their flexile branches. Shells of 

 every form and hue glide slowly along the stones, 

 or cling to the coral boughs like fruit ; crabs and 



