120 THE HAUNTS OF LIFE 



called sea-spiders, whose precise relationships 

 are uncertain ; lamp-shells and colonies related 

 to the sea-mat ; all sorts of molluscs bivalves, 

 snails, and cuttles ; the degenerate sea-squirts, 

 some on long stalks ; and numerous strange 

 fishes. Here the list ends for we dare not 

 include sea-serpents in the abyssal fauna at 

 least. 



Walt Whitman's famous picture, " The World 

 below the Brine," refers not so much to the 

 Deep Sea as to the bottom of the sea within 

 the shore-area in the wide sense. But it is 

 incomparably fine. 



" Forests at the bottom of the sea, the branches and leaves, 



Sea-lettuce, vast lichens, strange flowers and seeds, the 

 thick tangle, the openings, and the pink turf, 



Different colours, pale grey and green, purple, white, and 

 gold, the play of the light through the water, 



Dumb swimmers there among the rocks, coral, gluten, 

 grass, rushes, and the aliment of the swimmers, 



Sluggish existences grazing there or suspended close to 

 the bottom, 



Sight in these ocean depths, wars, pursuits, tribes breath- 

 ing that thick-breathing air, as so many do." 



FITNESSES OF DEEP-SEA ANIMALS 



Many of the fixed animals of the great 

 depths have long stalks which raise the 



