PART 111 

 THE ATOLL AND ITS PROBLEMS 



CHAPTER XI 



THE ATOLL AS A WHOLE 



I HAVE chosen to dwell somewhat fully upon the life-history 

 of the coral colony for the reason that in the study of the 

 development of atolls and reefs, a knowledge of the growth 

 tendencies of the colony is an essential. The question of the 

 formation of atolls is in reality a zoological one, for every 

 square inch of their structure is the outcome of the activities 

 of living creatures, and if we are to appreciate rightly the 

 building of atolls, it is necessary to understand the lives of 

 the zooids which produce them. In the portion of this book 

 dealing with the corals themselves I have endeavoured to 

 show that the study of corals cannot be properly conducted in 

 a museum, by the examination of dead specimens far removed 

 from the site of their growth, and from all the influences of their 

 environment. In these chapters I would endeavour to estab- 

 lish the fact that the development of atolls and reefs is, 

 in reality, a question to be studied by a careful inquiry into 

 the mode of life of the coral zooids themselves ; — that it is 

 not a problem to deal with in laboratories or museums, for the 

 laboratory can never be a substitute for the reef as a field for 

 experience. 



In the explanation that I shall furnish for the making of 

 reefs and atolls, no other processes will be invoked than the 

 normal growth tendencies of the coral zooids, and those effects 

 upon land-making that may be seen wherever the winds and 

 the waves act upon matter. I am convinced that the more 



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