62 



THE UNIVERSE. 



fluviatile plants, the flowers and fruits of which are generally 

 unknown. 



For a moment, but alas only for a moment, the opinion 

 of the French botanist seemed to be confirmed by the most 

 strict observation. In the eighteenth century Count Mar- 

 sigli announced to the scientific world that he had discov- 

 ered the flowers of the coral, and that consequently its veg- 

 etable nature could no longer be called in question. By 

 placing branches of coral in sea-water, immediately after 

 they had been fished up, the Italian naturalist saw the bud- 

 like protuberances which cover its surface open like so 

 many eight-pe tailed flowers, formed of elegant white and 

 star-shaped corollas, outlined upon the reddish bark of the 

 stems. Marsigli doubted no longer ; these were the flowers 



of the paradoxical shrub ; he 

 had solved the problem left 

 unsettled by Tournefort. In 

 his joy, when announcing his 

 discovery to the assembled 

 Academy of Sciences, to 

 whom he had forwarded his 

 specimens, he wrote to the 

 president, " I send you some 

 branches of coral covered with 

 white flowers. This discovery 



25. Red Coral, magnified : Corallium ru- has made me paSS for almost 

 brum. A, Polypi; B, Ciliated Ovule; 



c, Larva. a sorcerer in the country ; no 



person, not even the fishermen, having seen anything 

 similar." 



The illustrious and learned assembly was convinced, but 



