The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1913-02-03
sponges Composed of Glass.

The popular idea of a sponge is OF
a tough fibrouS substance with re-
markable capacity for absorbing nd
uids Many understand it to be the
subaaueous home which a colony OF
small animals build for their home.
Others are acquainted with the dis
covery of science that the sponge Is
itself a salt water animal, with pores
in it's body wall, which, when dried
in the sun, and thoroughly cleansed,
loses it's softer part and becomes the
sponge of commerce. The recently
discovered fact that on the bottom OF
the deep sea in certain localities the
body wall of living sponges is actually
composed of glass seems Incredible
Yet this is perfectly true. At those
great depths, where the pressure oil
the surrounding water amounts TO
many hundreds pounds to the square
inch, the soft and pliable animal oil
shallow waters is transformed into
glass-and yet it lives and multiplfes
as ordinary sponges do. This is a
most interesting and remarkable ex-
ample of the real relationship in ma
ture of animal, vegetable and mineral
substances Specimens of these glass
sponges brought up from the depths
as great as 5000 feet below the surface
of the ocean are of glass as pure as
any manufa ctured by man, in forms
of great beauty, with ornamentation
in tracery more delicate and graceful
than could be achieved by the most
practiced human hands. Nothing was
known of them earlier than the mid6ie
of the Nineteenth century, and it Il
only quite recently that science has
determined them to be true SpongeS,
with a wall structure of silica, the
principal mineral substance of which
glass is made. This discovery is due
to the great German traveller, Siebold,
oh of a01 tn oo-
waters off the coast of Japan, returned
with several of them to his native
country where he demonstrated to
fellow scientists the truth of his claim.
Japanese fishermen had grappled WITH
these specimens on the bottom OF
some of their deep bays where the
absence of currents and other dis
turbance made possible the develop
ment of their wonderful filaments. Ill
honor of the discoverer of their true
character the scientists have named
this extraordinary creature, both ami
NAL and mineral in substance.
Hyatenema Sieboldii Spongiae Mira
bills. These Japanese fishermen had
mounted their specimens on wood and
Siebold at first supposed them to be
the product of remarkably capable
glass spinners. 1t was only when he
realized the mechanical impossibility
of creating forms of such delicate ar
afterward corroborated by his examI-
nation of freshly caught glass sponges. |
These he discerned to be true sponges
with body walls of glass instead of
fibre. When the strange creatures
were dried in the sun and cleansed
Of all the softer parts-as is the pro-
cess with the sponges of commerce |
-Siebold held in his hands variations ]
Of the same delicately beautiful forms /
which had so excited his curiosity. I,
These forms of actual glass were the !
skel etons of the animal sponges, just 1
as the familiar sponge is the skeleton
Of the same species of animal making +,
it's home in shallow waters. Later in
Vestigation revealed how these glass |
sponges are born and developed into
maturity. The beginning is the head
having the form of a fine glass needle.
These needles take on all kinds of
shapes, possibly due to accidental cur
rents or the position in which they
happen to fix themselves, so that there |
IS an infinite variety of forms assum-
I'd by the glass sponges.-Atchison
Globe