The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1889-11-25
THE OCEANS BED.
In It's Deepest Parts Its DesolatiOn Must
he Extreme.


He Extreme.
Despite the fanciful pictures which
,ome writer's 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 surface, which carcasses supply
the nourishment for the scanty fauna
tnhabiting the abyssal region in
some places more than five miles from
the sunshine, and the microscope re-
veals that the Shiny matter covering
this deepest ocean bed is very similar
in composition to the ancient chalk of
the cretaceous period, while mixed
with it here and there are minute
metallic and magnetic bodies which
have been proved to be dust from the
meteorites.
At long intervals phosphorescent
light CLEANS from the head of some
passing fish, which has strayed hither
from a higher 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 phosphorsscent
animals swimming about are much
more numerous, and the nearer we
get to the littOral zone more and more
phosphorescent lights appear, till at
length the scene becomes truly ami
mated. When only 1,200 feet separate
us from the sunshine we come upon
the first seaweed and kelp, Il, 200 feet
is the deepest limit of plant life in the
water); but we must rise still another
1000 feet and more, and get as near
the top as 120 feet before we find any
reef-building corals.
AS plants do not live in the deep sea,
the deep-sea animal either prey on one
another or get their food from dead
organisms and plants which sink down
to them. Thus Maury says: THE
sea, like the snow-cloud with its flakes
in a calm, is always letting fall upon
It's bed showers of microscopic shells"
And experiment proves that a 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 abyssal 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 the contrary, have enor-
nous eyes. and these very likely
congregate around such of their num-
Der as are phosphorescent. and many
perhaps follow the moving lamps about
wherever they go. And so bright is
this light on many of the fish brought
up by the dredge that during the
brief space the animals survive it is
not difficult to read by it.
The reason why fishes and mollusks
living more than three miles under
water are able to bear pressure of
several tons Is that they have exceed
lngly loose tissues, which allow the
water to flow equally through every
lnterstice, and thus to equalize the
weight. When the pressure is re-
moved they perish. In the Challenger
expedition sent out by the British
Government, all the sharks brought
up from a depth of little less than
three-quarters of mile were dead
when they reached the surface
Household Words.