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THE CELTIC PROVINCE: 

 ITS EXTENT AND ITS MAEINE FAUNA. 



In the year 1859 there was published the ' Natural History 

 of the European Seas,' by Professor Edward Forbes, edited 

 and continued by Robert G-odwin- Austen. This work gave an 

 admirable review of all that was then known respecting the 

 distribution of animal life in the Marine Provinces of which it 

 treated. But since that period the exploration of the North 

 Atlantic has been so greatly extended that certain views formerly 

 enunciated no longer hold good. 



It was maintained in 1859 that living forms could not exist 

 in the abyss of the ocean, it being argued that the enormous 

 pressure of the superincumbent mass of water must gradually, 

 and ultimately entirely, lead to the extinction of animal life. 

 Forbes wrote : " As we descend deeper into this region " (i.e. 

 of deep-sea corals) " its inhaliitants become more and more 

 modified, and fewer and fewer, indicating our approach towards 

 an abyss where life is either extinguished or exhibits but a few 

 sparks to mark its lingering presence. Its confines are yet 

 undetermined"; but elsewhere he expresses his belief that the 

 zero of animal life will probably be in about 300 fathoms. 



Extended soundings, dredgings, and trawlings in all oceans 

 have since proved that a very different state of things prevails. 

 At no depth in the ocean is life extinct, and it is an interesting 

 fact that the life which exists in the abyss is characterized by 

 many peculiar forms which find their allies in geological strata 

 of very distant ages. 



The existence of varied animal life at enormous depths was 

 finally proved in the dredgings of the "Porcupine" in 1869, 

 when Professor Wyville Thomson procured living animals 

 belonging to most classes of the Invertebrata, at a depth of 

 2,435 fathoms, about 200 miles south-west of Ushantin Brittany. 

 Since that time it has been proved that at however great a depth 

 a dredge or trawl has swept the bottom, fishes and all classes 

 of the Invertebrata are found to be represented in the material 

 brought up. 



