23 8 Life in the Open 



so that in peering down from above one looks through 

 innumerable halls, arcades, and parterres that extend 

 away to infinity. 



In South America, especially about the Falkland 

 Islands, the kelp (Macrocystis) attains enormous pro- 

 portions, sections estimated at one thousand feet in 

 length having been taken up and used as anchors for ves- 

 sels, which thus were saved the trouble of lowering and 

 hoisting anchor. On this desolate coast the kelp forms 

 a protecting fringe for fishes which otherwise would 

 be unable to exist, owing to the constant and heavy 

 surf that is always piling in, and thus incidentally the 

 miserable Fuegians are saved from starving, subsisting 

 almost entirely upon the fish, the barren, half-frozen land 

 producing little or nothing. Everywhere along-shore 

 this forest of hanging vines constitutes shelter for many 

 animals. It is a forest of seaweed rising from great 

 depth, rolling over and over in strange but graceful 

 convolutions in the surf or tidal currents, a menace to 

 swimmers and often to vessels. 



Along the California coast at extreme low tide the 

 kelp lies in such thick masses that it forms an almost 

 impassable barrier ; so much so that once in making a 

 port we found it almost impossible to force a sixty-ton 

 power yacht through it. The entrance of the harbour 

 was made ultimately by stationing a man on the bow- 

 sprit to pass the word how the helmsman should steer 

 to avoid the enormous leaves that, in tangled masses, 

 blocked the way. These huge vines do not indicate a 



