MABINE BOTANY. 23 



thickets which, growing low, and unvisited by storms, are 

 slightly fixed to their growing-places by means of simple 

 shield-like disks. The breaks of lawn, if such they may be 

 termed, are covered with beautiful sea-weeds, of various 

 forms and hues; and the trunks of the loftier tree-like 

 species present extraneous tufts of vegetation, analogous to 

 lichens and mosses. Parasitic sea- weeds, glossy and soft as 

 silk, or formed of transparent membranes, also become 

 attached to the stems and branches ; some minute and ex - 

 quisitely tinted, others of larger growth, but each the home 

 or storehouse of joyous creatures, that glide in and out, and 

 find both food and shelter in the peaces to which they are 

 assigned. And as beneath the waters, so also, not "(infre- 

 quently, upon their surface, is the same diffusion of animated 

 existence. 



Navigators in old times, when steering through those 

 ocean meadows, concerning which Columbus spoke in his 

 voyage of discovery, saw in them only vast extents of ver- 

 dure ; but men belonging to the days in which we live, 

 when the light of science continually discovers new subjects 

 for instruction, find that they are tenanted by numerous 

 living creatures. Nor is this peculiar to those archipelagos 

 of floating islands. A recent voyager relates, that he ob- 

 served a large pine, similarly peopled, which drifted some 

 way beside his vessel. Barnacles adhered in great numbers 

 to the trunk; and among the branches and trailing fuci 

 were shrimps and teredos, with large water insects, and a 

 kind of small fish. The latter especially seemed full of 

 life, for they swam merrily about, darting at one time 

 among the branches, at another emerging to the full light 

 of day ; crabs sunned themselves on the parasitic fuci, and 

 creatures of strange forms sprang from out the waters, to 

 sieze the pendent tufts of sea-weed. " Methought," said 

 the narrator, " while looking at them, no portion of the 

 globe is more thickly inhabited, or affords, in proportion to 

 its size, a greater amount of animal enjoyment, than this 

 wave -tossed isle," 



