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THE MIGHTY DEEP
[Illustration:
_By permission of the Apothecaries’ Co., Ceylon_
BURST OF THE SOUTH-WEST MONSOON AGAINST THE COLOMBO BREAKWATER
_Frontispiece_
]
THE MIGHTY DEEP
AND WHAT WE KNOW OF IT
BY
AGNES GIBERNE
AUTHOR OF “SUN, MOON, AND STARS”; “RADIANT SUNS”; “ROY, A TALE OF THE
DAYS OF SIR JOHN MOORE”; ETC., ETC.
“If I had asked thee, saying, How many dwellings are there in the
heart of the Sea? ... peradventure thou wouldst say unto me, I never
went down into the Deep.” _2 Esdras_ iv. 7.
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS
London
C. Arthur Pearson Ltd.
Henrietta Street
1902
DEDICATED
TO THE REVERED MEMORY OF
VICTORIA THE GREAT, R.I.
SOVEREIGN LADY OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE
QUEEN OF THE OCEAN
AND
MOTHER OF HER PEOPLE
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
=ROY
A STORY OF THE PENINSULAR WAR=
_Crown 8vo, cloth, with illustrations, price 5s._
_PRESS NOTICES_
“An interesting and well-studied romance of military
adventure.”--_Scotsman._
“The illustrations are good, the writing is pithy, and the
tone well calculated to inspire youthful readers with lofty
ambitions.”--_Morning Advertiser._
LONDON: C. ARTHUR PEARSON, LIMITED
HENRIETTA STREET, W.C.
PREFACE
This little book makes no profession to be a systematic text-book
of Oceanography, or to contain exhaustive discussions of the latest
discoveries and theories. The subject is far too vast to be so dealt
with in one small volume. A library would almost be needed for the
purpose.
Much information has been gained within the last decade or two of years
about the Ocean, its make, the laws which govern its movements, its
dark and mysterious depths, the various deposits upon its bed, and the
innumerable living creatures by which it is inhabited. All that I have
attempted has been to cull a certain number of leading facts from the
great storehouse of knowledge, and to put them in order, for the many
who love sea-breezes and ocean-waves, and who may like to know a little
more about the friend whom they so often visit.
With regard to Authorities, I must acknowledge my indebtedness to the
following books, among many others: _The Realm of Nature_, by Dr. H.
R. Mill; _Report of the Scientific Results of the Voyage of H.M.S.
Challenger--Deep Sea; Coral Reefs_, by Professor Dana; _Standard
Natural History_, edited by J. S. Kingsley; _The Microscope_, by
Carpenter, revised edition; _British Merchant Service_, by R. J.
Cornwall-Jones; _Resources of the Sea_, by McIntosh; _Harvest of the
Sea_, by J. G. Bertram; also numerous papers and articles in the
_Geographical Magazine_, _National Geographical Magazine_, _Scottish
Geographical Magazine_, _Proceedings of Royal Society of Edinburgh_,
_Annual Report of Smithsonian Institution_, _Natural Science_, etc.,
etc., by such writers as Sir John Murray, Dr. H. R. Mill, Professor
James Geikie, Albert Prince of Monaco, Admiral Sir W. H. L. Wharton,
Mr. John Milne, Mr. A. Günther, Mr. John Aitkin, etc.
In conclusion, I beg heartily to thank the Librarians of the Royal
Geographical Society and the Zoological Society of London for the
generous courtesy with which they have lent me books and supplied
latest information, without which this little book could never have
been written; also to express my warm gratitude for the invaluable help
afforded by the criticisms and suggestions of the kind and able friends
who have read my MS. and proofs.
WORTON HOUSE, EASTBOURNE.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. “THE SEA! THE OPEN SEA!” 1
II. SALT WATER 10
III. EARTH’S VAST OCEAN 19
IV. SUBJECT TO LAW 27
V. IN OCEAN DEPTHS 37
VI. RIVERS IN THE SEA 50
VII. OF WIND AND WATER 61
VIII. AN OCEAN OF AZURE 70
IX. ICE-NEEDLES TO ICE-MOUNTAINS 79
X. RECEIVING--TO GIVE AGAIN 89
XI. A STORY OF CONFLICT 102
XII. ABOUT THE LONG PAST 110
XIII. OLD OCEAN AS A BUILDER 122
XIV. HOW CHALK IS MADE 135
XV. OF OCEAN-WEEDS 149
XVI. CORAL ARCHITECTS 163
XVII. OVER THE OCEAN-BED 176
XVIII. MULTITUDINOUS LIFE 185
XIX. OCEAN FLOWERS AND LAMPS 196
XX. ARMOURED MYRIADS AND MONSTERS 207
XXI. A GOODLY COMPANY OF CRABS 220
XXII. THE WORLD OF FISHES 230
XXIII. SOME ODDITIES OF FISH-LIFE 241
XXIV. BEHEMOTHS OF THE OCEAN 252
XXV. “DOWN TO THE SEA IN SHIPS” 261
XXVI. AN EMPIRE: OCEAN-WIDE 276
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
The burst of the South-west Monsoon against the
Colombo Breakwater _Frontispiece_
Bore of the Tsien Tang Kiang _Facing page_ 34
An Iceberg, showing the section under water ” 86
Diatom Cases ” 154
Part of Diatom Case ” 156
Deep-sea Fishes ” 182
Beam-trawl and Tow-net employed in deep-sea research ” 188
A Deep-sea Crab ” 220
A Blue Whale ” 254
THE MIGHTY DEEP
CHAPTER I.
“THE SEA! THE OPEN SEA!”
“How cheery are the mariners,
Those lovers of the sea,
Their hearts are like its yesty waves,
As bounding and as free.”--P. BENJAMEN.
“Therefore also do men entrust their lives to a little piece of wood.”
_Wisd. of Sol._ xiv. 5.
Once upon a time, over two thousand years ago, our ancestors lived in a
country smaller than ours, to the north-east.
They had not yet taken possession of two Isles, which in the then
distant future were to become the Headquarters of a world-wide Empire.
Already one characteristic of the race was prominent; they delighted in
the Sea. Within their small limits of power they ranged the Ocean, they
wrestled with its fury, they subdued it to their will, they rejoiced in
its strength, they found often their graves beneath its surface. The
English then, as now, were Ocean-folk.
May it not be that we in modern days love the sea, and flock to
its shores, and carry our Flag to its furthest bounds, because our
forefathers, the Norsemen, the Angles, the ancient Vikings, found their
joy in it? Their march, like ours, was on the mountain-wave; their
Home, like ours, was on the deep.
Probably with them, as with us, it was not always an unchastened joy.
Even a hardy Viking might know the unpleasant consequences of Ocean’s
rougher moods. But no such discomforts drove him to stay ashore.
Had our forefathers been made of feebler stuff, had they been easily
checked in their enterprises, centuries of history must have been
changed. The development of English nature would have followed other
lines.
In those days the fight could not but be severe. No mighty ironclads,
no huge three-deckers, existed. No P. and O. liners, no great merchant
ships ranged the seas. Our forefathers tackled the waste of waters with
what we should consider the merest cockleshells. Even in these days we
know what is meant by “perils of the seas;” but in those days the term
must have carried a hundred-fold deeper meaning, both to the brave
fellows who ventured on the stormy main, and to the waiting wives and
mothers on land.
All the more honour to them that they were not daunted. Each man’s
victory or failure in life’s battle cannot but help to shape the course
which his descendants in future ages will pursue.
The Sea for us has a vivid personality. We know grand old Neptune so
well, with his trident and his snowy hair, his dashing waves and his
impenetrable depths, his gentle breezes and his furious gales, his
moods of mild serenity and his fits of vehement wrath. He has his
faults; but in spite of all we love him.
At one time the Sea was for men a type of the Infinite, of the
Immeasurable, of the Boundless. We use still the same words; but they
have lost some of their force.
In these days the whole ocean has been mapped out from shore to shore.
We know exactly what countries lie round each part of it. We can tell
how long and how wide it is in any direction. As we stand on the shore,
and talk of the “boundless ocean,” we are perfectly well aware that
we are looking across to France or Spain, to Germany or Ireland or
America. Grand and far-reaching the sea still is, but to us no longer
“boundless.”
In ages gone by, those who stood upon the coasts of Palestine or Egypt,
of Greece or Italy, gazed towards unknown horizons, across what was
to them an illimitable ocean. The civilised world consisted of a few
countries bordering the Mediterranean on the east; and those countries
shaded off into unexplored barbaric regions. As for the “great Sea,”
as they called that which we regard as hardly more than a huge inland
lake, it was in their eyes the embodiment of Infinitude.
At a very early period, long before the English Nation was dreamt of,
before the Roman Empire had grown into being, while the polished Greek
of the future was still a semi-savage, a nation of Ocean-lovers already
existed. These were the Phenicians, foreshadowing in their pluck and
enterprise the sea-going British of later times.
They, unlike the sailors of other nations, did not merely hug the
shore, but ventured out into the trackless ocean. They, unlike the
sailors of other nations, did not go upon the sea only in daylight, but
they traversed it also in the dark hours of night.
At first they were content with the nearer reaches of the Indian Ocean,
and with the more eastern parts of the Mediterranean. But gradually
they wandered farther. Colony after colony was planted beyond Egypt,
till they reached the Pillars of Hercules, known to us as the Straits
of Gibraltar, to face a wild and strange Ocean, full of mystery.
There they made a startling discovery, enough to impress the more
thoughtful minds among them. Far to the east, in the “Indian Ocean” of
our days, their sailors had been acquainted with high and low tides;
while throughout the Mediterranean scarcely any tides existed. But in
the open sea, outside the narrow Channel, they found the very same
tidal changes as in the eastern ocean.
It is hardly to be supposed that any one of them had a mind of such
far-seeing grasp that he should be able to conjecture the grand truth
of eastern and western oceans being ONE--swayed by the same influences,
governed by the same laws.
A Phenician of those days, catching a glimpse of this truth, would have
been worthy to take rank beside our Sir Isaac Newton of after days.
They are believed to have observed the coincidence; no doubt with a
feeling of wonder; and probably it was to them merely a coincidence.
Very little was then understood of the most everyday and commonplace
workings of Nature.
Not much, indeed, can be said with certainty of what the Phenicians did
truly discover. Some observations they must have made of the heavenly
constellations; and the Pole-star at least must have been known to
them, otherwise it is impossible to imagine how they could have steered
their vessels at night, in an age when the Mariner’s Compass was
unknown. They are supposed to have sailed far south on the west coast
of Africa, if they did not actually round the Cape of Good Hope.
It does not appear that their knowledge was passed on to the Greek
nation. Either they were curiously reticent of what they knew, or else
such records as they may have left were destroyed and forgotten.
In after times the Carthaginians, descendants of Phenician Colonists,
were, like their forefathers, sea-lovers, sea-explorers, searching
the main, not as travellers search now from pure love of knowledge,
or from a liking for adventure, but for the sake of commerce. The
Carthaginians, however, instead of being able to make use of previous
discoveries, and to work onwards from a point already gained, had to
start afresh and to find their way--just as if it had never been found
before--to and beyond the Pillars of Hercules.
To the Greek imagination that wide mysterious Ocean, opening out from
the narrow Strait, was unattractive and terrible. It was a sea of
limitless distances, of fog and gloom, of blackness and death; not an
unexplored Ocean of possible glory and beauty and wealth.
Time glided by, and man advanced in his acquaintance with Land and Sea;
but with the latter slowly. It was not until five centuries ago--and
five centuries are but as a day, compared with the full stretch of
history--that two weighty steps were taken.
One step was southward. One step was westward.
The African Continent, all along its northern region, had been the
scene of very old-world history. But the south was shrouded in
darkness. A brief glimmer of light, perhaps thrown there in Phenician
days, had been long long lost sight of.
In the year A.D. 1486, a far leap from Phenician and Grecian days,
Bartholomew Diaz made discovery of the Cape of Good Hope, and one year
later Vasco da Gama sailed round it. These two explorers were only a
little in advance of two greater voyagers. In 1492 Christopher Columbus
started on his first cruise into the unknown West--and touched Land.
Less than thirty years later, Magellan’s famous voyage was accomplished
to those Straits, between Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego, which bear
his name. By that time the existence of the American Continent had
become an established fact.
But that Continent had to be searched out. And the Ocean, though its
limits were widened in men’s imaginations, was very far from being
mapped and fenced around with definite boundaries. Years of exploration
still lay ahead; and many a valiant explorer had to fall a martyr in
the cause of Science, before mystery should yield to knowledge.
Doubtless, in those days as in these, there was always somebody to ask,
“But what is the use? What good can it do to us to learn that there are
lands beyond the sea? What shall we gain by it all?”
Time alone, with its developments, with the growth of the human race,
with the enormous possibilities then undreamt-of, could answer such
questionings. Happily, brave explorers have seldom been lacking,
who loving knowledge for its own sake have been content to labour
patiently, not for money, not for fame, not for immediate results, but
for the simple delight of better understanding the world around them,
and for the benefit of future generations.
And indeed, if once we begin clearly to realise that the things which
we see and hear, the wonders of Land and Ocean, are the outcome and
expression of Divine Thought, we shall scarcely deem time wasted, which
is spent in trying to find out a little more about those wonders.