The morning news., 1888-11-22
THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA.
It's Bed q Desert of Ooze and Slime
After the First Mile.

ALI0I bl4C 4 IL oO AhAAS.
From the Catholic Magazine.
Despite the fanciful pictures which some
writers have drawn of the ocean bed. its
desolation. at least in its deepest parts,
must be extreme Beyond the first mile it
is vast desert of slime and ooze, upon
which is constantly dripping rain of dead
carcasses from the suface, which carcasSeS
supply the nourishment for the scanty
fauna inhabiting the abysmal reglon-ln
some places more than five miles from the
sunshine, and tho microscope reveals that
the Shiny mater covering this deepest ocean
bed is very similar in composition to the
ancient chalk of tho cretaceous period,
while mixed with it here and there are
minute metallic and magnetic bodies,
which have been proved to be dust from
meteorites.
At long intervals phosphorescent light
CLEANS from the head of some passing fish,
which has strayed hitAer from higher and
happier zone But it is not until we have
mounted a good deal nearer the surface
that the scene changes for the better We
now meet with forests of brilliantly colored
sponges, while the phosphorescent animals
swimming about are much more numerous,
and the nearer we get to the littoral zone
more and more phosphorescent lights ap-
| pear, till at length the scene becomes truly
us from the sunshine we coms upon the first
seaweed and kelp 1900 feet is the deepest
limit of plant life in the water; but we
must rise still another thousand feet and
more, and get as near the top as l20 feet be-
| fore we find any reef building cOrals.
AS plants do not live in the deep sea, the
deep-sea animals either prey on one another
or get their food from dead organism and
plants which sink down to them. Thu
Maury says: 1.-The sea, like the snow cloud
| with its flakes in a calm, is always letting
fall upon its bed showers Of microscopic
shells" And experiment proves that tiny
shell would take about a week to fall from
the surface to the deepest depths. Since
sunlight does not penetrate much farther
| than the littoral zone, there would be
beyond this perpetual darkness except
| for phosphorescence. Many of the
animals inhabiting the continental and
| abysmal zones have merely rudimentary
| eyes, But these blind creatures have very
| long feelers, which help them to grope their
way along the bottom. Other deep sea
animals, on she contrary, nave enormous
eyes, and these very likely congregatt
| around such of their number as are phos
phorescent, and may perhaps follow the
| moving lamp posts about wherever they go
| And so bright Is this light on many of tht
fish brought up by the dredge that during
the brief space the animals survive it is nO
difficult to read by it.
The reason why fishes an mollusks livin?
more than three miles under water are able
to bear pressure of several tons, is tina
they have exceedingly loose tie ,ues, whict
allow the water to flow equally through
every interstice, and thus to equalize th
weight When the pressure is removed
they perish. In the Challenger expeditions
sent out by the British government, all th
sharks brought up from depth of littl
less than three-quarters Of mile wer
dead when they got to the surface.