178 



THE OPAL SEA 



Conditions 

 of growth. 



has nothing like the foliage of the maple or 

 the blossom of the horse chestnut. 



Indeed, the wonder is not that such odd 

 plants grow in the sea, but that there should be 

 plants there of any kind. The salts and other 

 minerals of the water would seem sufficient in 

 themselves to destroy, but they are not ; absence 

 of light and air would seem to be blighting, but 

 it is not. The endeavor is not stifled. Nature 

 with her marvellous resources adapts the plant 

 to its habitat and, out of what might be thought 

 desperate conditions, produces forms of useful- 

 ness and beauty. The growths are given claws 

 like a bird's foot wherewith they cling to the 

 rock; they have no branches but in their place 

 long stems and fronds through which they ab- 

 sorb floating particles in the water; and they 

 perpetuate their kind by budding, by division, 

 l)y fertilization. In the economy of nature 

 even the cold grottoes of the shore, and the 

 bleak, muffled ledges of the deep shall not 

 lie fallow, but bring forth increase that the 

 species shall not die out and that no corner of 

 the sea shall lack its garb of beauty. 



The wealth of nature's resources, her suffi- 

 ciency unto each and every crisis, never seem to 

 fail. And how she moulds her children to their 

 varied dwelling places and fits them for their 



Place of 

 growth. 



