Lab
Library
Journal
Shop
Sign in
to keep
Share image
1
164
Glaucus; Or, The Wonders of the Shore
·
Charles Kingsley
123
On
that
leg
grows,
amid
another
copse
of
the
grey
polypes,
a
delicate
straw-coloured
Sertularia,
branch
on
branch
of
tiny
double
combs,
each
tooth
of
the
comb
being
a
tube
containing
a
living
flower;
on
another
leg
another
Sertularia,
coarser,
but
still
beautiful;
and
round
it
again
has
trained
itself,
parasitic
on
the
parasite,
plant
upon
plant
of
glass
ivy,
bearing
crystal
bells,
{181b}
each
of
which,
too,
protrudes
its
living
flower;
on
another
leg
is
a
fresh
species,
like
a
little
heather-bush
of
whitest
ivory,
{182}
and
every
needle
leaf
a
polype
cell—
let
us
stop
before
the
imagination
grows
dizzy
with
the
contemplation
of
those
myriads
of
beautiful
atomies.
And
what
is
their
use?
Each
living
flower,
each
polype
mouth
is
feeding
fast,
sweeping
into
itself,
by
the
perpetual
currents
caused
by
the
delicate
fringes
upon
its
rays
(so
minute
these
last,
that
their
motion
only
betrays
their
presence),
each
tiniest
atom
of
decaying
matter
in
the
surrounding
water,
to
convert
it,
by
some
wondrous
alchemy,
into
fresh
cells
and
buds,
and
either
build
up
a
fresh
branch
in
their
thousand-tenanted
tree,
or
form
an
egg-cell,
from
whence
when
ripe
may
issue,
not
a
fixed
zoophyte,
but
a
free
swimming
animal.
And
in
the
meanwhile,
among
this
animal
forest
grows
a
vegetable
one
of
delicatest
sea-weeds,
green
and
brown
and
crimson,
whose
office
is,
by
their
everlasting
breath,
to
reoxygenate
the
impure
water,
and
render
it
fit
once
more
to
be
breathed
by
the
higher
animals
who
swim
or
creep
around.
Marker
Marker
Fine marker
White-out
Fine white-out
Circle
Paint
Unmarker
Hand
Scalpel
Dice
Sieve
Purify
Undo
Redo
Start over
