CHAPTER XXV. 



"DOWN TO THE SEA IN SHIPS" 



"With Ships the Sea was sprinkled far and wide." — Wordsworth. 



" Fair is our lot — O goodly is our heritage ! 

 (Humble ye, my people, and be fearful in your mirth !) 

 For the Lord our God Most High, 

 He hath made the Deep as dry, 

 He hath smote for us a pathway to the ends of all the Earth." 



RuDYARD Kipling. 



AX 7'ITH Whales we have reached the hi;^dicst 

 class among Ocean creatures. Yet it is 

 impossible to end here. Some few pages must 

 be given to those among men who " go down 

 to the Sea in ships," who "do business in great 

 waters." 



Not that in any sense can Man be reckoned 

 as an inhabitant of the " Mighty Deep." But 

 thousands of men spend the greater part of their 

 lives upon the Deep ; tens of thousands more 

 continually pass and repass over its surface. 



In the beginning of history ships became soon 

 a necessity, partly as a means of going from 

 place to place along the coasts or of travelling 



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