THE PACIFIC OCEAN. 279 
along the reef, even where there is no aperture. 
The surf in violent gales can roll up upon the reef 
masses of torn-off coral, weighing many: hundred- 
weights; such a mass, once lodged, would be the 
nucleus of an islet; the sand would speedily accu- 
mulate around it, which the sun would soon cement 
into a mass, and then the islet would be ready for 
vegetation. 
The following lines are beautifully descriptive 
of the formation of an atoll, though the author 
seems to hold’ the erroneous notion of the whole 
structure being elevated from the bottom by the 
coral polypes :— 
“ Millions of millions thus, from age to age, 
With simplest skill, and toil unweariable, 
No moment and no movement unimproved, 
Laid line on line, on terrace terrace spread. 
To swell the heightening, brightening, gradual mound, 
By marvellous structure climbing tow’rds the day. 
Each wrought alone, yet altogether wrought; 
Unconscious, not unworthy, instruments, 
By which a Hand invisible was rearing 
A new creation in the secret deep. 
Omnipotence wrought in them, with them, by them; 
Hence what Omnipotence alone could do 
Worms did. * * * * * * 
“Atom by atom thus the burthen grew, 
Even like an infant in the womb, till Time 
Deliver’d Ocean of that monstrous birth, 
A Coral Island, stretching east and west, 
In God’s own language to its parent saying, 
‘Thus far, no farther, shalt thou go; and here 
Shall thy proud waves be stayed:’—A point at first 
It peer’d above those waves; a point so small, 
I just perceived it, fix’d where all was floating; 
And when 2 bubble cross’d it, the blue film 
