CHAPIER..l1 
THE OPEN SEA 
Contrast between Shore and Open Sea—The Floating Sea- 
Meadows—The Animals of the Open Sea—Sea-Deserts— 
Swimmers and Drifters—The Whale as a Great Bundle 
of Fitnesses—The Story of the Storm Petrel—Open-Sea 
Insects — Turtles —Sea-Snakes and Sea-Serpents — Fit- 
nesses of Open-Sea Drifters—The Story of the Floating 
Barnacle—Hunger and Love in the Open Sea—The Open 
Sea as a Nursery. 
Y the open sea, naturalists mean the well- 
lighted surface-waters well away from 
the shallow shelf around the islands and con- 
tinents. It is not the mere surface of the 
water, it includes all the zones of water 
through which the light penetrates freely; 
and that, we must remember, is much farther 
than at the coast where the waves stir up the 
sea-floor and bring so many fine particles into 
suspension in the water, that much of the light 
is stopped. In the upper levels of the open 
sea or pelagic haunt, there are multitudinous 
minute plants mingled with the animal ten- 
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