196 TOILERS IN THE SEA. 



diate allies, and that those authors are not far wrong 

 who claim for the Tubipora a near kinship to the 

 ordinary " red coral of commerce." 



Until about 1727 the red coral was held to be a 

 marine plant, but now it is acknowledged as an animal 

 production, closely related, in its scientific affinities, 

 to the sea fans. 



It has been shown by a recent author that the 

 beautiful red coral, with which most of us have been 

 acquainted from infancy, bears in its Latin name 

 (Corallium rubrum] the poetical designation of " the 

 red daughter of the sea." * 



It is found in the Mediterranean, and the Red Sea 

 at various depths from ten to nearly a thousand feet. 

 " Each stalk of coral " writes Moquin - Tandon, 

 " resembles a pretty red leafless shrub, bearing little 

 delicate star-like flowers. The stalks of this little 

 tree are common to the association, and the flowers 

 are the polypes. These arborescent formations 

 generally hang from some shelf, and so grow down- 

 wards, and not like ordinary vegetation. They are 

 found growing together in bushes, or copses, or 

 spreading out, as we have said, into veritable forests. 

 The stems have a soft reticulated cortex or bark, 

 which is full of little cavities, permeated by a milky 



1 Korallion from Kore, a daughter, and afos, the sea ; 

 Latinised curalium, or corallium, with rubrum, red. 



