THE AKCHIPELAGO OF CHAUSEY. 35 



pharmaceutical remedies were needed, I procured 

 them from the main-land. By these means I was 

 enabled to be of real use to these worthy people 

 during my stay amongst them, and my attempts to 

 serve them were rewarded by their unbounded affec- 

 tion. It would have been hardly safe for any one to 

 enter into a quarrel with me, when, on a Sunday 

 evening, their sentiments of regard for my person 

 were warmed by generous libations, for at such a 

 time the whole island would have risen as a single 

 man to defend Monsieur le docteur. 



I had not come to Chausey, however, to study 

 statistics or practise medicine. The sole object of 

 my travels was the sea ; the sole aim of my inquiries 

 was to unravel some of the many mysteries which 

 lie buried beneath its sands or hidden below its 

 waves. The oceanic world with its marine creation 

 in no way resembles the world revealed to us in the 

 interior of continents, nor can our streams, ponds, or 

 rivers, however large, afford us any idea of it. Side 

 by side with those colossal monsters which man learns 

 to overcome within the dreary depths of ocean ; side 

 by side with innumerable productions that minister 

 to our wants or our luxuries, and whose history is 

 familiar to very children ; side by side with these 

 dwell widely differing and strangely organised races, 

 whose very existence is known only to a few. To 

 observe these creatures we need enter upon no 

 perilous enterprise such as the capture of the whale 

 demands ; we require no immense nets such as are 

 used in catching the tunny, herring, or mackerel ; we 

 need no heavy dredge to scrape the bottom of the sea 



D 2 



