Bellows Falls times. [volume] (Bellows Falls, Vt.) 1856-1965, 1873-10-24
The Ocean.

| The ocean.
What do you know about things ten
miles down IN the stupendous valley of
the ocean? On land, here, the vegeta-
ton of the Alpine base is not that of its
summit the wild goat skips upon the
peaks of the Himalayas, but the rhi.
noceros has his lair miles below. Our
acquaintance with the mysteries of the
deep must be absolutely and literally SUI
perfcial, for we assume that its mountain
tops alone are revealed to us, and these
dimly, and that to its valleys our senses
can never penetrate. All the creatures
that disport themselves on or near the
surface, are more or less familiar to US
The whales, the porpoises, and the sharks,
that come tumbliug over Its undulation
much in the same way that bufialoes
come laundering over the waves of the
prairie. The vast broods that feed on
its shallow banks, and are taken there
from to feed shallower mortals, are all
within our grasp, and we grasp them.
On the ledge of the iceberg sits enthron-
ed the walrus, and we salute him as the
elephant of the sea, and esteem unspeak-
ably for the commercial value of his
ivory tusks. The huge sea COW has no
mystery for us. We wake the harmless
creature up from its bed Of seaweed on
the isolated rock, and having wished it
good morning, we stick spears into it,
and convert it to the noble purpose of
gain. The magnificent sea unicorn, king
of the Arctic waters, is no stranger for
him. We have cognizance of all these
sea creatures and many more, the range
of which appears to be in the upper re-
gions of the deep; but what can we aver
of the mystic realms that lie far, far
down about the bases of the great srb-
marine mountain ranges mountains
compared with which our highest dry
land peaks are possibly nothing but mere
hillocks?
There is a sea monster known to fish
ermen as the horned ray, a N onster most
| fearful in itself, but interesting as an il
lustration of that which is, and a sug
gestion of that which may be-a verita-
BILE dragon of the sea, whose lateral fins
extend like wings, and frequently meas
ure more than thirty feet from tip to tip.
This voracious fish will sometimes make
its appearance among the swimmers IN
the surf, and taking one under each arm,
so to speak, descend with them to the
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-eater glides with his prey. The
great fishes and sea-beasts that are
known to us may be creatures of the
upper deep alone, never descending be-
low certain depth, lest they encounter
far more hideous and powerful monsters
than themselves, which dwell at the bas-
es of the marine mountain leagues far
ther down. One can easily imagine
polypus anchored there below in some
distracting valley, of which it is the lord
and tyrant-a stupendous mass Of bloat-
ed matter, grasping at everything within
a circumference of half mile, and alb
sorbent of all living creatures under the
size of whale. In the China sea there
are bivalves-whether oysters or mus
Giles | am not certain-the shells of
which are large enough to contain a man
properly doubled up. If a monster like
this inhabit comparative shadows, there
is no limit to ones imaginings of the BIZ
vavular enormities at the bottom, ten
miles farther down.-AHantic Monthly.