THE MANGKOVE. 245 



tical as that of a Surmullet, with protuberant lips. 

 The air-bladder of this fish is very beautiful ; it is 

 shaped somewhat like a heart with the point split 

 instead of the summit ; it is of the consistence of 

 kid leather, and of the purest white, with a brilliant 

 satin lustre, but in drying it becomes stiff, semi- 

 transparent, and bladder-like. A playful imagina- 

 tion might trace in it when fresh, a resemblance to a 

 sporting gentleman's wash-leather breeches, tied at 

 the waistband. 



THE MANGROVE. 



Eminently characteristic of a tropical shore is the 

 dense belt of Mangrove bushes with which it is in 

 many places lined. To an European it is a strange 

 sight to see a grove of trees growing actually out of 

 the sea, and his admiration is not diminished when 

 he examines more closely the structure of these 

 singular plants. The extensive morass at Crab-pond 

 Point, a flat of fetid mud over which the tide flows 

 daily, is closely covered with Mangroves. The trunk 

 of every tree springs from the union of a number of 

 slender arches, each forming the quadrant of a circle, 

 whose extremities penetrate into the mud. These 

 are the roots of the tree, which always shoot out in 

 this arched form, often taking a regular curve of six 

 feet in length before they dip into the mud. The 

 larger ones send out side shoots which take the same 

 curved form at right angles ; and thus by the cross- 

 ing of the roots of neighbouring trees, and of the 

 subordinate roots of each, a complex array of arches 



