Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1873-10-30
: What is In the Depths of the Sea.
tBy Charles Dawson Stanley

What do we know about things ten
miles down in the stnpendous val
leys of the ocean? On land, here,
the vegetation on the Alpine base
ia not that of its summit; the wild
goat skips upon the peaks of the
Hima'ay ~, but the rhinoceros has
his lair down below. Oar acquain.
lance with the mysteries of the deep
must be absolutely and literally SUI
perhcial, for we may assume that its
mountain-tops alone are revealed to
us, and these dimly, and that TO its
valleys orr senses can never pene
trate. All the creatures that dis
port themselves on or near its sur :
face. are more or less familiar to us
the whales, the porpoises, sharks.
come tumbling over it's undulations
much in the same way that bnffiloes
come laundering over the waves of
the prairie. The countless broods
that feed on its shallow banks. and
are taken therefI ON to feed shallow
or mortals. are all within our grasp,
and we grasp them. % the eige of
the iceberg ats enthrOned the wal,
rus, and we salute him IA the ele
plant Of the sea, and esteem him IN.
speakably for the commercial value
Of his ivory tusks. The huge seas
COW has no mystery tor us We
wake the harmless creature from its
bed of seaweed, on the isolated rock.
and having Wished it a good mora
ing, we stick spears into il, and cor.
vert it to the noble purpose of gain
The magnificent sea-unicorn, king Of
Arctic waters, il no stranger TO Us,
which Is just so much the worse for
him. We have cognizance of all
these sea creatures and many more,
the range of which appears 10 be in
the upper regions of the deep hut
what can we aver of the mystic
realms that lie far, far down about
the bases of the great submarine
morntain ranges-mountains com
pared with which our highest dry land
peaks ara possibly nothing but mere
hllOcks?
There is q sea monster known to
fishermen as the Horned Ray, a mon
ster most fearful in Itself, but inter-
esting as an illustration of that which
iS,and suggestion of that which may
be-a veritabIe dragon Of the sea,
whose lateral fns exterd lik wings,
and frequently measure more than
thirty feet from tip 20 tip. Tn is v0.
raciOus fish sometimes makes its ap-
pearance among the swimmers of the
surf, and taking one under each arm.
so to speak, descend with them to
depths unknown. Until ocean shall
have been dried up, or drained off,
no human being can ever explore
the strange grottoes into which this
hideOus man.sater escapes with his
prey. The great fishes and sea
beasts that are known TO NJ may
be creatures of the uTrer deep alone,
never descending below a certain
depth, lest they encounter far more
hideous and powerful monsters than
themselves, which dwell at The bases
of tho marine mountains leagues
farther down. Ole can easily i'm
agine polypus anchored there be
low in some distracting valley, of
which it is the lord and tyrant-a
stupendOus mass of bl0ated matter,
grasping at everything within cir
cumference of half mile, and alb
sorbent of ali living creatures under
whale. La The China Sea there are
biz alves-whei her oysters or mussels
| am not certain-the shells of which
are large enough 20 contain man
properly doubled up. If monster
like this iuhabits comparative shall
lows, there is no limit To ones i'm
aginings OF the bivalvular enormilier
at he bottom ten miles farther down.
Atlantic Monthly for October.