336 The National Geographic Magazine 



of the farther Pacific. And the magni- 

 tude of the internal force attested by 

 these outward manifestations is ample to 

 account for even so great changes in the 

 earth-crust as those involved in likening 

 the broad Oceanian archipelago with our 

 own Bahamas. Other reasons for view- 

 ing Oceania as a mountain-set land 

 drowned by subsidence during a later 

 geologic age might be drawn from the 

 laws of continental growth ; but these 

 may be passed over. 



Accordingly, the problem of the gen- 

 esis of the Pacific must be left open 

 pending research in many lands and 

 along many lines ; yet for the present 

 it would seem safer to regard this great- 

 est of geographic features as the product 

 of proper earth-movements and conse- 

 quent geographic changes rather than 

 a direct heritage of cosmic interaction — 

 the birth of the basin may better be 

 viewed as of the earth earth y than of 

 the stars starry and remote. 



THE PACIFIC AS A VITAL PROVINCE 



During most of the time since earth 

 began the great ocean was, like other 

 provinces, mindless, scriptless desert ; 

 and it remains in exceptional degree bar- 

 ren because of the poverty of its paleonto- 

 logic record — for the fossil record is one 

 of fecund shorelands and fruitful inlands 

 rather than watery wastes. So present 

 knowledge must rest on the probability 

 that, despite the changes of the ages, 

 despite the shifting of seas and the lift- 

 ings of lands, some part of the world's 

 greatest and deepest ocean was also the 

 world's earliest ocean, with the conse- 

 quent probability that aquatic life began 

 within or about its bounds. The course 

 of development of living things from the 

 lowly forms of the prime to the motile 

 organisms of the deeps, on to the plants 

 pushing out over pristine lands, then to 

 creeping and flying things, and thence 

 up to the era of brute strength, and 

 finally to that of cunning and slowly 



brightening mentality, was far too long 

 and devious to be traced without the 

 constant help of fossil records; yet it is 

 worth while to note that the rich flora 

 of Pacific shores and the abundant fauna 

 of Pacific depths seem in themselves to 

 tell of long-continued and largely inde- 

 pendent vital development. True, the 

 field is so vast that the naturalists of the 

 world have been able to touch it but 

 here and there ; even such vigorous 

 work as that directed by Agassiz and 

 described all too briefly by a speaker in 

 this course (Dr Townsend) does little 

 more than reveal the wealth of the prov- 

 ince, so that what may be called, by ex- 

 tension of a current term, the vital sta- 

 tistics of the Pacific remains a sealed 

 book. It is indeed known that the ma- 

 rine fauna of the Pacific is notable for 

 the high proportion of distinct forms, 

 the large number of unique genera and 

 species of fishes, as well as of other or- 

 ders of sea-born life. It is know r n, too, 

 that the great ocean forms a congeries 

 of faunal districts vaguely limited by 

 latitude and more sharply defined by 

 varying depth with the attendant 

 changes in pressure, light, and heat 

 from sun-kissed surface to freezing and 

 darkling deeps where organisms' must 

 either produce their own light by ob- 

 scure organic processes or live in eternal 

 gloom; yet it would be rash even to at- 

 tempt listing the species of any of these 

 districts, much less those of the entire 

 basin, save as a record of advancing 

 knowledge and a guide for further re- 

 search. Stretching as it does half way 

 round the globe near the equator and 

 thence to both polar ice-fields, ranging 

 as it does from sunny shallows to frigid 

 depths, and holding as it does half the 

 water of the globe, the Pacific is a reser- 

 voir of marine vitalit}' of capacity pass- 

 ing our standards of measure; the scat- 

 tered facts gathered by naturalists are 

 at once suggestive and promising — sug- 

 gestive of long, long development in the 

 unwritten past as well as of present 



