THE SPONGES 63 



CHAPTER VI 



THE SPONGES 



MANY who are familiar with the domestic 

 sponge have never seen a sponge in a growing 

 state, and would find it almost impossible to re- 

 alise that a sponge may be a thing of beauty. 

 And yet sponges are quite common on the rocky 

 shores of our own country. It is true that they 

 do not form large masses, like the sponges grown 

 in warmer seas, which we import; but the 

 smaller growths, massed together, often cover a 

 considerable space of rock, and are conspicuous 

 by their beautiful colouring. Some sponges are 

 crimson, and some green; while one of the com- 

 monest is a brilliant orange-yellow. The latter 

 may often be found near low-tide mark, on a 

 shelf of rock under growing seaweed. If the 

 explorer has any doubt what the object is, it may 

 easily be identified by the touch, which though 

 moist and firm in the growing state, is still the 

 unmistakable " feel " of sponge. Where the re- 

 ceding tide exposes a large surface of steep rock, 

 for instance in caves, sponges may be found cov- 

 ering the rocks as thickly as mosses do on land. 

 Masses of dead sponge, consisting of branching 

 parallel fingers a few inches long, may often be 

 found in the dead state, washed up on the shore ; 

 these are the usual drab colour of a dead sponge. 



The encrusting sponges which grow on rocks 

 present a mass, so to speak, of little hillocks : in 

 kinds which attain a larger growth, these may al- 

 most be described as branches. Each little hil- 

 lock or branch has a hole at the top ; and on the 

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