134 THE SEA. 



The Sicilian seas, according to Quatrefages, from 

 their habitual stillness and transparency, afford pecu- 

 liar facilities for exploring the submarine world. As 

 he leans over the side of his boat, the philosopher 

 glides over plains, dales, and hillocks, which in some 

 places naked, and in others carpeted with green or 

 brownish shrubbery remind him of the prospects of 

 the shore. The eye distinguishes the smallest inequa- 

 lities of the piled-up rocks, plunges a hundred feet 

 deep into their cavernous recesses, and clearly discerns 

 the undulations of the sand, the worm-holes of the 

 rugged stone, and the feathery tufts of seaweed, defin- 

 ing all with a sharpness that seems to reduce to 

 nothing the intervening stratum of fluid, and makes 

 the observer forget the unearthly character of his 

 picture. He seems to be hanging in mid-space, or 

 looking down, like a bird from the air, upon the land- 

 scape below. Strangely-formed animals people these 

 submarine regions, and give animation to them. 

 Fishes, sometimes singly, like the sparrows of our 

 streets, or the warblers of our hedges, sometimes 

 uniting in flocks like starlings or pigeons, roam among 

 the crags, wander through the thickets of the algce, 

 or disperse and shoot away in all directions, as the 

 shadow of the boat passes over them. Caryopliyllice, 

 Gorgonice, Sea-anemones, and thousands of other zoo- 

 phytes, with flower-like petals, blossom beneath the 

 tempered rays of the sun, enjoying his undimmed 

 brightness, without his raging heat. The long and 

 feathery kinds stream out from the hollows of the 



