The ocean / By P.H. Gosse.

  • Gosse, Philip Henry, 1810-1888.
Date:
1846
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The ocean / By P.H. Gosse. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    strewed everywhere around. The beauty and no- velty of such a scene in the animal kingdom long arrested my attention, but after twenty-five minutes of constant observation, I was obliged to withdraw my eye from fatigue, without having seen the tor- rent for one instant change its direction, or diminish in the slightest degree the rapidity of its course. I continued to watch the same orifice, at short inter- vals, for five hours, sometimes observing it for a quarter of an hour at a time; but still the stream rolled on with a constant and equal velocity.’ Sponges, in general, appear to have little choice of situation, but to grow wherever the young offset or gemmule happens to drop, whether on the rock, on a shell, or on a sea weed. If two of the same species, growing side by side, come into contact, their edges unite, and the two form one mass, so perfectly one that the most practised eye could de- tect no indication of the line of union. On the con- trary, if the neighbours be of different species, the edges adhere by contact, but there is no union ; and both of the contiguous edges will grow up far be- yond their natural level, like walls striving to over- top each other, until the action of the waves pre- vents the continuance of a mode of growth so un- natural. Dr. Johnston speaks of two species of Sponge which had become so intermingled in growth, without being united, that, being of differ- ent colours, they presented the appearance of a co- loured map. The same writer has figured a much branched species (Halichondria oculata) growing on the back of a small crab : the latter has a grotesque