The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1893-07-16
CREATURES OF OCEAN DEPTHS.
They Fall to Pieces When the Pressure
ofWater no Longer Holds Them To-
gether.
MON the Cosmonolltan.

ofWater no Longer Holds Them To-
gether.
From the Cosmopolitan.
The new submarine world now explored
and mapped out presents q very different
picture from that painted for us by the
poets. But short time has elapsed since
the bottom of the ocean was supposed to
be the counterpart of the face of the earth
above water-with hills and valleys with
precipitous mountains lifting toward the
surface ana profound gorges sinking to
unfathomable depths. The ocean floor is
far less diversified than the land.
Here and there, to be sure, islands in
mid-Ocean are the SUBMITS of enormous
mountains, rising more or less abrubbY,
from a generally level surface, and the
sea lying over a narrow, depressed region
in the northwestern Pacific reaches its
greatest depth But this is exceptional /;
in its general character the ocean bottom
consists Of vast fat or slightly uudulating
plains. An extraordinary circumstance
that has been noticed with interest and
that always creates surprise when first
learned, is the entire absence of foreign
matter in the deeper part of the ocean s
floor.
Ofall the vessels lost in midocean; of
all the human beings that have been
drowned; Of all the marine animals that
have persisted; of all the clay, sand and
gravel let fall by dissolVing icebergs; of
all the various substances drifted from
every shore by shifting currents, not q
trace remains; but in their place water
from 1000 to $500 fathoms In depth COW
ers the uniform deposit Of thick, blush,
tenacious slime, called globigerina ooze.
A bit Of this under powerful lens is q
a1af If M
The ooze is composed almost entirely of
the daintiest, most delicately beautiful
shells imaginable.
At depths greater than $500 fathoms
the bottom Of the sea consists mainly of
products arising from exposure, for al
most incalculable periods, to the chemical
action of sea water, of pumice and other
volcanic matters. This finally results in
the formation Of red clay deposits that
are considered characteristic of the pro-
foundest depths OF the ocean. Carbonate
of lime, which in the forms of the shells
Of fora-minifera, makes up so large part
of the glObigerina Ooze, is here almost en-
tirely absent.
Sea water is very nearly universal
solvent, and before any shell, large or
small, reaches the bottom Of these tire
mendous abysms it is chemically eaten
up, literally dissolved result which
the enormous pressure of the water must
materially hasten. At l 900 fathoms the
weight of the water pressing on all sides
of an object immersed to that depth is
very nearly one ton to the square inch, or
more than one hundred times that sus-
tanned at the sea level, and at the great
est depths the pressure is so increased
that il would seem nothing could with
stand tin fact, heavy metal cylinders
let down with the sounding apparatus are
sometimes, on being drawn up again to
the surface, found. bent and collapsed ;
strongly made glass vessels which the
metal enclosed are shattered into frag-
ments.
lIn the profoundest abysms of the sea
are strange forms of life, that never,
save when brought up by the traWl, see
the upper light. The work carried on by
means of the United States Fish Com
mission vessel, the Albatross, has estab-
lished the fact that forms of sea life in
habiting upper waters may descend to
about 200 feet from the surface, but
that below this, to a depth of 300 or $50
fathoms, a barren zone interVenes where
marine life seems absent. But still
deeper strange TO say, has been disCoV-
cred an abundant and varied fauna, new
TO science, living under conditions Of ire
mendous pressure, and paucity Of the life
sustaining eminent Of oxygen, that in
duced an element ZoolOgist to say quite
recently: what we know of the great
est ocean depths fOrbids US TO expect to
find them inhabited by living organisms. -
Here, indeed, survive forms of life the
like of which no inhabitant of the upper
world, not even tho sun himself, has
looked upon before the dredges of the
Challenger the AlbatrOss, the Blake and
similarly equipped vessels dragged up
marine creatures from congenial cold and
dark.
It might reasonably be supposed that
these denIzens OF great sea depths would
be built more firmly and strongly than
surface animals to resist the pressure of
the element in which they live, but it is
just the contrary. The most universal
characteristic of these creatures is the
looseuess and iabbiness of texture they
exhibit Indeed, they seem to need the
excessive pressure Of the water about
them to keep their parts together, for
when they are brought to the surface
thew are ready to fall to pieces. 1t is d
problem 50 strangely are some of them
formed, how they can move from place to
place were they not entirely below the
disturbing element Of wave action they
would. to all appearance. be helpless.
Inhabiting these abysmal spaces. as
completely cut off from communication
with the upper waters as we are from the
inhabitants of other planets, we can only
vaguely speculate on their habits and
Judge their manners Of life from their
somewhat remote aualogies to the surface
species nearest akin TO them. Plant life
is entirely absent from their place of
abode, and although they doubtless prey
upon each other, some original sources of
food supply must, Of course, be conjectur-
ed to exist.