56 TOILERS IN THE SEA. 



or dead, found scattered over the globe. Deep-sea 

 soundings bring them up from the greatest depths 

 that the line has yet reached, whole catacombs of 

 them are entombed in the chalk and limestone 

 rocks ; they are scattered amongst the sand of the 

 sea shore. In Europe and Asia together they cover 

 thousands of miles. They may be found almost 

 everywhere. The traveller who thinks he is out of 

 their reach on the plains of Egypt is mistaken, for 

 if he attempts to climb the pyramids of Ghizeh, he 

 must do so by trampling on myriads of Foraminifera, 

 imbedded in the nummulitic limestone at its base, 

 which, could they but speak, might tell him of days, 

 long before the toiling Israelites were making bricks 

 without straw, of days long before Solomon was 

 King of Jerusalem, or Elijah girded himself to run 

 before Ahab to Jezreel (fig. 11). 



In order to test the accuracy of other observers, as 

 well as to procure some new determinations of the 

 number of organisms approximately to be found in 

 chalk, we undertook the experiments some years 

 ago, of which the following is a summary : An 

 ounce of chalk, as taken from the pit, was subjected 

 to the washing process already detailed, the lighter 

 fragments being washed away, until a sediment was 

 left of nearly pure foraminiferous shells. Half of 

 this was cleaned, as much as possible, by boiling in 

 caustic potash, and ultimately it was demonstrated 



