84 WILD LIFE OF SCOTLAND 



which are hidden away beneath the opaque exterior 

 of land forms, in all their marvellous detail. It is 

 this that makes them so invaluable to the zoologist. 

 The processes are simple. It was in the sea that 

 life began. It is in the sea that we make our 

 nearest approach to the mysterious genesis. 



In earlier, more unsophisticated days, these 

 things would have been regarded as interesting in 

 themselves. But an utilitarian spirit is entering 

 into the age, in accordance with which, attention is 

 being increasingly directed to the economic, and 

 practical aspects of marine zoology. To the sports- 

 man, as we shall see hereafter, all land animals fall 

 quite naturally into the two divisions, game and 

 vermin ; and, in like manner, from this new point 

 of view, marine life divides itself, quite as naturally, 

 into food fishes and their food. 



The arrangement is delightfully simple, and 

 should save one a world of trouble, consisting as 

 it does of the two easily remembered gradations : 

 what man eats, and what man's food eats. 



These forms, which, at one time, would have 

 been known as flowers, or gems, or by some other 

 pleasant title happily the names will stick have 

 been slumped together, and re-christened the larder 

 of the sea. 



