218 ISLES OF SUMMEE. 



penetrable mystery hides in the shadows where no sunlight enters, 

 and, by a most striking contrast, hel^os to glorify and adorn the 

 beautiful and unique forms that the light reveals. 



New and wonderful combinations of these (to us) strange forms 

 of marine animal and vegetable life, when first observed and 

 closely studied, is the occasion of new expressions of delight. If 

 sea-nymphs and ocean fairies exist anywhere in the world of 

 waters, their chosen home should surely be in these coral bowers 

 and grottoes; and if they are ever embodied, their outward adorn- 

 ments cannot in color surpass that of the fish we saw sporting in 

 the sunlight, and darting into the dark recesses of this beautiful 

 submerged coral world. Exquisite in form, the perfection of 

 gracefulness in motion, the peers of birds of gayest plumage in 

 color, they seemed specially adapted to harmonize with, and grace 

 and adorn this lovely spot. As with water, so ''our friends at 

 home think they know fish — but they don't." Some are brilliant 

 yellow, others a rich scarlet, and others a glossy indigo blue. 

 Here are seen fish in suits of emerald green, and others in clerical 

 black. Costumes of satin and silver may also be observed. Be- 

 sides all these there is in the piscatory dwellers among the corals 

 a most gorgeous color display, resulting from the ringing and 

 striping and fringing and tipping and spotting of the fish. In- 

 deed, it seems as if all the tints of the floral world and of the 

 rainbow had been used in the most perfect and lavish manner 

 to beautify and adorn these small specimens of the native dwellers 

 of the ocean world. One of these, most gorgeously colored, was 

 brought to us in a pail of sea water at our hotel, and we had an 

 opportunity to more critically examine it. It was six inches long. 

 Capt. Sampson called it the humming bird fish. We bottled it 

 in alcohol, but its beautiful colors soon faded away. A descrip- 

 tion of some of these remarkable fauna of the sea the reader will 

 find in tlie next chajiter of this book. The real in the coral 

 bowers is more g-oro-coiis than the ideal. 



