232 
ceding storm, and when the surface of the sea is en- 
tirely quiet at a distance, the shore is nevertheless 
so forcibly beaten by the surge, that mountains of 
foam from 50 to 60 feet high, arise not only upon the 
rocks, but also on the sandy flats. 
I am not to inquire here into the causes of this phe- 
nomenon, which seems, may be referred to the general 
motion of the great mass of the water in the ocean, 
increased or diminished by the projection and shape of 
the coast; but we may consider the results, as far as 
they are connected with our present subject. 
When the sea beats softly against a shore, the shells 
and zoophytes settle there; the sea-plants easily take 
root, and increase as well as the living beings; and 
these animated bodies, dissolving themselves succes- 
sively, fatten the ground, and make it still fitter for pos- 
terior generations. The accumulation of these frag- 
ments during centuries, which in the eye of nature are 
but a day, affords a vegetable earth sufficiently abound- 
ing with organic particles to give life to plants and ani- 
mals, which at their turn contribute to the use of man. 
But when, on the contrary, the sea beats with fury 
against a shore, the animal and vegetable parts of the 
sea withdraw from it, as from a rock against which 
they would be dashed to pieces; the sea-plants can take 
no root there, or are swept away by the fury of the waves 
before they can fix themselves. The poor animal or 
the plant, which has been driven here by the current, 
must also perish from the violence of the waves, and 
their fragments will be dashed to a great distance. 
When it happens that by the effect of the current of the 
