OCEAN GARDENS; 



soap-bubble, to which their transparency and pris- 

 matic flashes of colour give them a curious resem- 

 blance; and their ephemeral existence, dependent 

 upon the will of even an angry ripple of the element 

 in which they live, is doubtless as brief. 



The deep has even its butterflies, as well as the 

 land. The fluttering of the fins of some small and 

 brightly-coloured fish has been compared to the action 

 of the wings of moths — as also the members, likewise 

 used for locomotive purposes, of some of the animals 

 of the univalve shells. Then there are minute phos- 

 phorescent animals, which represent the fire-flies of 

 the south, pouring a living flood of light as they 

 glide along — some emitting silvery, and others 

 golden flashes, like floating lamps that seem hurry- 

 ing to light up the darkness of the far ocean depths. 



Even the worms are gorgeous and wonderful in 

 this subaqueous world. The Serpulce^ with their 

 radiating coronets of crimson brancJiice ; the Fecti- 

 naria, with its golden comb, glittering in burnished 

 brightness ; and the Nereis, with white and crimson 

 stripes — are all wonderful as well as beautiful objects. 

 But the Halithea, or sea-goddess, as Lamark has 

 named it, from the extraordinary beauty and the 

 georgeous colours that radiate from the silky hairs 

 with which it is clothed, surpasses them all. 



IS 



