UNDER-SEA PHOTOGRAPHY 159 



These stone-trees live and grow somewhat like 

 their cousins in plant life in that they grow mostly 

 from their tips or ends of their branches which are 

 made up of millions of microscopic forms of animal 

 life. Each one of these tiny bits of life has the power 

 to take in through their bodies a small quantity of 

 salt water, sieving out still smaller forms of life, get- 

 ting their nourishment in that way and secreting a 

 little lime, which forms their rock skeleton on the 

 outside of their bodies, protecting them. They re- 

 produce, live their life span, die, others take their 

 places, build their stone-protecting homes, pass on, 

 and in a year's time their living branches grow about 

 half an inch. Of course, many are broken off, ground 

 into sand, some of them buried in the sand, but still 

 life and growth goes on till they reach the surface. 

 Storms beat them to pieces, throw up the mass into a 

 ridge, which year by year is added to. Seeds like 

 cocoanuts, voto and others not affected by salt 

 water, take root and soon we have the coral atoll 

 of romance and story which nature has shaped like a 

 horseshoe an entrance and lagoon in the center 

 where formerly was the ocean; man comes, the island 

 grows, keeping pace with its inhabitants. 



Under sea, in this work of picturing what is going 

 on, I found colonnades like paths in the forest, great 

 caves large enough to walk into, the sides and top 



