204 HIGHWATER MARK. 



the margin, all round the circumference, it is plain, like 

 the border of a dinner-plate, but marked with radiat- 

 ing bands, which are -alternately opaque and pellucid 

 white. The area of our fairy plate is occupied with a 

 multitude of short tubes formed of the same white 

 shelly substance, which crowd closely on one another, 

 and project obliquely outwards and upwards from the 

 centre, in regular succession, forming radiating series. 

 Thus we can look down into the tubes, the circular 

 apertures of which are open ; but those nearest the 

 centre of the plate are much shorter, and can scarcely 

 be considered as tubes, but are rather shaUow 

 cells. 



The tubes are empty now ; they are like the houses 

 of London after the plague ; whole streets tenantless, 

 because the inhabitants have died out. But hold ! 

 here is another tiny fragment on the root of the same 

 weed. Let us examine this. 



It is much like the little china plate, but the mass 

 is more spreading, and projects in irregularly sinuous 

 lobes, like the outline of a coast in a map, and is of a 

 pale lilac hue. Its surface is studded with glassy 

 tubes, which are larger than the former, and are pret- 

 tily arranged in short rows, with considerable space 

 separating row from row. Three, four, or five tubes 

 start from the surface and stand obliquely upwards, 

 soldered together by their sides, forming a single row; 

 then, a little way off, three or four form another simi- 

 lar row, and so the whole surface is covered. But the 

 edge of the plate is composed of tubes much crowded, 



