68 A NATURALIST ON DESERT ISLANDS. 



ripple on the surface, and lose oneself in the mysterious 

 stillness of the world beneath. The water over these 

 banks, as we have said before, is gin-clear. There are, 

 may be, eight, nine or ten fathoms of water, that is to 

 say, anything up to sixty or more feet ; but a bright 

 tropical sun lights up the fairyland below, so that you 

 can see with ease the smallest object upon the bottom, 

 even to those animals which by means of their mimetic 

 colouring seek to render themselves inconspicuous upon 

 the sand and coral mud. And among groves of sea-fans 

 and waving zoophytes; in and out of dark and mysterious 

 grottoes ; and over bright stretches of white coral sand, the 

 multicoloured procession of fish passes Hke a silent 

 pageant of another world. Some, as we have already said, 

 are striped like zebras or wonderfully coloured perch; 

 some are in coats of exquisite enamel ; some in vivid scarlet 

 with white spots; some in a motley of orange-blue and 

 turquoise-green. Fish there are here, both large and 

 small, fish of all shapes, perch-like, turbot-like, eel-like, 

 and even box-Hke. Beautiful fish and ugly fish, but 

 fish everywhere ; some good to eat, some poisonous, some 

 living and browsing among the waving fronds of sea- 

 weeds, some lying or crawling upon the bottom, others 

 lying in wait ready to dash upon their unsuspecting prey. 



It is a world of fish, a world of colour, and a world of 

 apparent peace and lazy bliss ; but a world, nevertheless, 

 of constant struggle and ever present tragedy. 



In spite, however, of the last undoubted facts, we may 

 perhaps be excused for quoting a line or two of Mr. F. G. 

 Aflalo from his " Sunset Playgrounds," where he describes 

 very similar scenes on the Coast of California. " They 

 give a glimpse of the perfect peace. You drift, as in an 

 airship, over lovely gardens in which gorgeous creatures 

 dart in and out of amazing tangles of flowers unknown 

 above sea-level. No dust troubles the canyons of their 

 mountain gorges. No voice breaks the stillness of their 

 groves and thickets. Their blooms have no scent. They 

 are God's gardens of sleep." 



