3O A Retrospect of Oceanography 



Regular work commenced only in February, when she left 

 the Canary islands to run her first line of trans-oceanic soundings, 

 and fundamental discoveries were made in the very first 

 week. On February 15, I873 1 , a sounding gave 1525 fathoms 

 in lat. 25 45' N., long. 20 14' W., and no sample of bottom. 

 It is remarkable, as indicating the views of the time, that the 

 absence of a sample of mud was not supposed to afford evidence 

 that the bottom was not soft, but only that the tube had 

 not acted. So far it was deemed to be inconceivable that 

 any part of the basin of the ocean could avoid being covered 

 with mud. One of the very earliest dredgings was made 

 on this spot, and its harvest was one of the most remarkable 

 of the cruise. It came up full of masses of jet-black branching 

 coral attached to masses of black-banded rock, and bearing 

 in its branches huge siliceous sponges. It was a sight which 

 I see now before me as clearly as I did when on the deck of 

 the "Challenger." Clearly the sounding-tube had not failed 

 in its duty. The black colour of the coral and of the stony 

 masses adhering to it was held to be carbonaceous, and I did 

 not examine it till some days afterwards. As the ship proceeded 

 westwards the depth increased, until, on February 21, a sounding 

 was obtained in 2740 fathoms, and the dredge which was 

 put over came up full of pure red clay, apparently without 

 any calcareous matter, and quite amorphous. In a similar 



weight, made under such circumstances, indicate the tendency of sound 

 and judicious thought. Professor Huxley, in the address for the year 

 1870, says, 'Many years ago (Saturday Review, 1858) I ventured to speak 

 of the Atlantic mud as " modern chalk," and I know of no fact inconsistent 

 with the view which Professor Wyville Thomson has advocated, that the 

 modern chalk is not only the lineal descendant of the ancient chalk, but 

 that it remains, so to speak, in possession of the ancestral estate ; and that 

 from the Cretaceous period (if not much earlier) to the present day, the 

 deep sea has covered a large part of what is now the area of the Atlantic. 

 But if Globigerina and Terebratula, Caput serpentis, and Beryx, not 

 to mention other forms of animals and of plants, thus bridge over the 

 interval between the present and the Mesozoic periods, is it possible 

 that the majority of other living things underwent a sea change into 

 something new and strange all at once?'" 



The other quotation is from Mr Prestwich, in 1871, but that from the late 

 Professor Huxley will suffice to show the tendency of opinion at the time. 



1 15 February 1873, the Birthday of Oceanography, see Contents, p. xii. 



