CHAPTER XII. 



WHAT SWAN ISLAND REALLY IS. 



AN IMAGnSTARY JOUENEY TO THE VAST DEPTHS SURROUNDING IT. 



So far, we have merely tried to visualize, in a sketchy 

 kind of manner, Swan Island as it appears to-day ; as it 

 would appear to the average man who happened to land 

 upon it — ^the completed, perfect thing, manifest above 

 the water, with all its teeming freight of living things, 

 both animal and vegetable. 



In doing so, we have made reference to certain rather 

 dry subjects ; such, for instance, as the peculiar marine 

 deposits known locally as "fuller's earth," which may have 

 appeared of little interest and hardly worth describing to 

 some of those who may perchance have followed us so far. 

 Of themselves, and by themselves, they are uninteresting ; 

 but if, as we now intend to do, we ask a simple question, 

 and try to get an answer, these and all other subjects 

 connected with the islands will assume, perhaps, a rather 

 different aspect. 



What then, after all, is this " Swan Island," which we 

 have been discussing at such length ? How comes it 

 to be where it is and how it is to-day — a thing of beauty, 

 above tide-level, basking in the warm rays of a life- 

 bestowing tropical sun ? 



Let us try and see ; and incidentally to picture some 

 of the conditions of life which obtain in the water-s from 

 which it has sprimg. 



