319 



LIFE IN THE OCEAN WAVE. 



IT really must be a pleasant life in the clear salt sea, 

 at least if we may judge from the splendid aquarium at 

 the Crystal Palace, where we are, so to speak, let down 

 some ten or twelve feet from the surface, and are 

 brought face to face with its inhabitants. Imagine a 

 spacious corridor, more than two hundred feet in length, 

 having one side filled with large single-paned plate-glass 

 windows, and' that corridor sunk bodily into the sea so 

 that through the windows we can watch the fishes, 

 crabs, lobsters, shrimps, and other denizens of the 

 shores, all busily engaged in their several vocations. 

 Such is the general idea presented to the visitor when 

 he enters the aquarium, and how that effect is produced 

 we shall presently see. Besides their glass windows, 

 through which we look into the sea, there are a number 

 of comparatively shallow open tanks, so arranged that 

 the visitor is able to look down upon the inhabitants 

 and se them through the surface of the water. 



Let us now take a walk round the corridors and 

 inspect the ocean as seen through the glass. Each open- 

 ing looks into a rocky cavern inhabited by various 



