SEA-WRACK 17 



the coast of Central America the sargasso weed 

 grows, clinging, as is the way with seaweeds, to 

 coral and rock and shell, and flowering and 

 fruiting after its lowly fashion. The berry-like 

 bladders with which the stems are strung, are 

 filled with gas and enable the plants to maintain 

 their position regardless of the state of the tide. 

 Vast quantities are torn away by the waves and 

 drift out to sea and these stray masses are what 

 we see on every trip south, and which, caught in 

 the great mid-ocean eddy, form the so-called 

 Sargasso Sea. Just as the unfailing fall of 

 dead leaves has brought about a forest loving 

 clique of brown and russet colored small folk — 

 frogs, crickets, lizards, birds and mammals which 

 spend much of their life hiding beneath or liv- 

 ing upon the brown dead leaves, so this never- 

 ending drift of weed has evolved about it a little 

 world of life, a microcosmos of great intimacy, 

 striving by imitation of frond and berry and 

 color to avoid some of the host of enemies for- 

 ever on the lookout. 



It is possible to place a bit of weed in a 

 tumbler of salt water and have a dozen people 

 examine it without seeing anything but a yellow- 

 ish brown frond with many long, narrow leaves 



