The Mighty Deep 



the Vegetable Life of the ocean, and we must 

 therefore let the wonderful Radiolarians alone. 



Properly the chapter on Vegetables ought 

 to have come before any chapter on Animals, 

 since we have been climbing upward from in- 

 animate Nature, and since all vegetables rank 

 below all animals. When on the topic of 

 Ocean-building, however, the subject of Chalk 

 seemed to follow naturally after that of Sand- 

 stone. And this little volume makes no pre- 

 tensions to stiff classification. 



No surprise need be felt at vegetables being 

 able to make or " secrete" flint and chalk. 

 This making is, as we have seen, an unconscious 

 work. The living jelly-speck secretes auto- 

 matically, not with intention. 



Such secreting is not confined to ocean 

 vegetables. Trees and plants on land manu- 

 facture a host of substances sweet oil, cocoa- 

 nut milk, indiarubber, and countless others.* 

 Forest trees in like manner grow their own 

 framework of hard wood, which may be said 

 to take the place with them of a skeleton. 



All this is a part of LIFE. Inanimate rocks 

 and stones may lie for centuries unchanged, 



* The spicules of silica may be seen on coarse grass, secreted 

 by the grass. 



152 



