The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1893-08-03
CREATURES OF THE OCEAN
DEPTHS.
They Pail 70 Pieces When the Pres
sure Of Water No Longer Holds
Them Together

plored and mapped out presents q very
different picture from that painted Tor
us by The poets But a short time has
elapsed since Che bottom VI the ocean
was supposed 20 be the counterpart Of
the face Of the c.rth above water
with bills and valleys, with precipitous
mountains lifting toward the surface
and profound gorgcs sinking to un.
iathomabIc depths. The ocean floor
is Car less diversified than the land
Here and there, to be sure, islands
in mid ocean are the SUBMITS Of enor.
nous mountains, rising, more or less
abruptly, from a generally level surface,
and the sea lying over narrow, de-
pressed region in the northwestern
Pacific reaches its greatest depth. But
this is exceptional; in its general char
acter the ocean bottom consists of vast
fiat or undulating plains. An extraor-
binary 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 oceans floor
OF all the vessels lost in midocean I;
Of all the human beings that have been
drowned Of all the marine animals
that have perished 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 a trace remains but in
their place water from 1000 to $500
fathoms in depth covers the uniform
deposit Of thick, blush, tenacious
slime, called globigerina ooze. A bit
of this under powerful lens is a reve-
Iation Of beauty not readily forgotten.
The ooze is composed almost entirely
of the daintiest, most delicatcly be auti-
full shells imaginable.
At depths greater than $500 fathom S
the bottom Of the sea consists mainly
Of products arising from exposure, for
almost incalculable periods, to the
chemical action Of sea water, of pumice
and other volcanic matters. This
finally results in the formation of the
red clay deposits that are considered
Characteristic Of the profoundest depths
Of the ocean. Carbonate of lime
which in the form Of the shells of fora
minifera, makes up so large a part o
the globigerina ooze, is here almos
entirely absent.
Sea water is very nearly a universe
solvent, and before any shell, large OF
small, reaches the bottom of thesC
tremendous abysms it is chemically
eaten up, literally diSsolved--a result
which the enormous pressure of thu
water must materially hasten. At Iooc
fathoms the weight of the water pres
sing OF all sides of an object immersed
to that depth is very nearly one ton t.
the square inch, or more than ont
hundred times that sustained at tn,
sea level, and at the greatest depth
the pressure is so increased that i
would seem nothing could withstand i
in fact, heavy metal cylinders lie
down with the sounding apparatus arr
sometimes, on being drawn up again t.
the surface, found bent and collapsed
strongly made glass vessels which tn
metal enclosed are shattered into frag
ments.
In the prof)undest abysms of tn,
sea are strange forms Of life, that never
save when brought up by the trawl, Sc
the upper light The work carried OF
by means of the United States Els
Commission vessel, the Albatross, ha
established the fact that forms Of Sc
life inhabltlng upper waters may des
cend to about 1900 feet from the SUI
face, but that below this, to a depth {
800 or goo fathoms, barren zone in
tervenes where marine life seems al
sent. But still deeper, strange to say
has been discovered an abundant an
varied fauna, new to science, living ar
der conditions of tremendous pressure
and pa.sity Of the lifesustaining Gle
ment Of oxygen, that induced an EN-
nent BIOLOGIST to say quite recently
"What we know of the greatest ocea
depths forbid US to expect TO find the
inhabited by living organisms" Her
indeed, survive forms Of life the like {
which no inhabitant Of the upper worlc
not even the sun himself, has locke
upon before the dredges Of the Cha
lenger, the AlbatrJss, the Blake, an
similarly equipped vessels dragged L
marine creatures from congenial col
and dark
1t might reasonably be supposed tn
these denlzens of great sea dept
would be built more firmly and strong
than surface animals to resist the pre-
sure Of the element in which they liv
but it is Just the contrary The mo
universal Characteristic of these cree
ures is the looseness and llabbiness
texture they exhibit Indeed, tn,
seem to need the excessive pressure
the water about them to keep the
parts together, for when they a
brought to the surface they are reat
to fall to pieces 1t is problem,