BY THE DEEP SEA. 



CHAPTER I. 

 THE SEA AND ITS SHORES. 



THE sea is the very fountain and reservoir of the life of this 

 globe. As the heart is to man and his fellow vertebrates, so is 

 the ocean to the world. It is the centre of the circulatory 

 system; and that system means the life, the health, the sus- 

 tenance of the body through which it sends its fluids. With 

 the destruction of the heart the human life must cease ; and 

 with the annihilation of the sea, could such a thing be possible, 

 all life on the globe must come to an end. We know it is the 

 source of all our vitalizing showers, of every fertilizing stream, 

 of every commerce-laden river. The sun and the winds distil 

 its waters, and carry the sponge-like clouds over the lands, to 

 drop their moisture in rain and mist and snow, making vegeta- 

 tion possible, and giving man two-thirds of his entire substance ; 

 for there are ninety-eight pounds of water in the man of ten 

 stone ! 



The ocean does almost everything for man. Consider this 

 statement well, and you will be astounded at the way in which 

 we are everywhere dependent, directly or indirectly, upon the 

 sea as the great reservoir of the world's water, and as the 

 manufacturer, by means of its myriads of living contents, of new 

 and useful material from the old and worn-out rubbish, the 

 very refuse and filth, that we daily pour into it. In fact, one 



