The Stories Mother Nature Told Her Children

Chapter I. the Star-Fish Takes a Summer Journey.

Once there was a little star-fish, and he had five fingers and five eyes, one at the end of each finger,--so that he might be said to have at least one power at his fingers' ends. And he had I can't tell you how many little feet; but being without legs, you see, he couldn't be expected to walk very fast The feet couldn't move one before the other as yours do. they could only cling like little suckers, by which he pulled himself slowly along from place to place. Nevertheless, he was very proud of this accomplishment; and sometimes this pride led him to an unjust contempt for his neighbors, as you will see by and by. He was very particular about his eating; and besides his mouth, which lay in the centre of his body, he had a little scarlet-colored sieve through which he strained the water he drank. For he couldn't think of taking in common seawater with every thing that might be floating in it,--that would do for crabs and lobsters and other common people; but anybody who wears such a lovely purple coat, and has brothers and sisters dressed in crimson, feels a little above such living.

Now, one day this star-fish set out on a summer journey,--not to the seaside where you and I went last year: of course not, for he was there already. No; he thought he would go to the mountains. He could not go to the Rocky Mountains, nor to the Catskill Mountains, nor the White Mountains; for, with all his accomplishments, he had not yet learned to live in any drier place than a pool among the rocks, or the very wettest sand at low tide: so, if he travelled to the mountains, it must be to the mountains of the sea.

Perhaps you didn't know that there are mountains in the sea. I have seen them, however, and I think you have, too,--at least their tops, if nothing more. What is that little rocky ledge, where the lighthouse stands, but the stony top of a hill rising from the bottom of the sea? And what are the pretty green islands, with their clusters of trees and grassy slopes, but the summits of hills lifted out of the water?

In many parts of the sea, where the water is deep, are hills and even high mountains, whose tops do not reach the surface; and we should not know where they are, were it not that the sailors, in measuring the depth of the sea, sometimes sail right over these mountain-tops, and touch them with their sounding-lines.

The star fish set out one day, about five hundred years ago, to visit some of these mountains of the sea. If he had depended upon his own feet for getting there, it would have taken him till this day, I verily believe; but he no more thought of walking, than you or I should think of walking to China. You shall see how he travelled. A great train was coming, down from the Northern seas; not a railroad train, but a water train, sweeping on like a river in the sea. Its track lay along near the bottom of the ocean; and above you could see no sign of it, any more than you can see the cars while they go through the tunnel under the street. The principal passengers by this train were icebergs, who were in the habit of coming down on it every year, in order to reduce their weight by a little exercise; for they grow so very large and heavy up there in the North every winter, that some sort of treatment is really necessary to them when summer comes. I only call the icebergs the principal passengers, because they take up so much room; for thousands and millions of other travellers come with them,--from the white bears asleep on the bergs, and brought away quite against their will, to the tiniest little creatures rocking in the cradles of the ripples, or clinging to the delicate branches of the sea-mosses. I said you could see no sign of the great water train from above: that was not quite true, for many of the icebergs are tall enough to lift their heads far up into the air, and shine with a cold, glittering splendor in the sunlight; and you can tell, by the course in which they sail, which way the train is going deep down in the sea.

The star-fish took passage on this train. He didn't start at the beginning of the road, but got in at one of the way-stations somewhere off Cape Cod, fell in with some friends going South, and had altogether a pleasant trip of it. No wearisome stopping-places to feed either engine or passengers; for this train moves by a power that needs no feeding on the way, and the passengers are much in the habit of eating their fellow-travellers by way of frequent luncheons.

In the course of a few weeks, our five-fingered traveller is safely dropped in the Caribbean Sea; and, if you do not know where that sea is, I wish you would take your map of North America and find it, and then you can see the course of the journey, and understand the story better. This Caribbean Sea is as full of mountains as New Hampshire and Vermont are; but none of them have caps of snow like that which Mount Washington sometimes wears, and some of them are built up in a very odd way, as you will presently see.

Now the star-fish is floating in the warm, soft water among the mountains, turning up first one eye and then another to see the wonders about him, or looking all around, before and behind and both sides at once,--as you can't do, if you try ever so hard,--while his fifth eye is on the lookout for sharks, besides; and he meets with a soft little body, much smaller than himself, and not half so handsomely dressed, who invites him to visit her relatives, who live by millions in this mountain region. "And come quickly, if you please," she says, "for I begin to feel as if I must fix myself somewhere; and I should like, if possible, to settle down near my brothers and sisters on the Roncador Bank."

Chapter Ii. Coraltown on Roncador Bank.

Where is Roncador Bank, and who are the little settlers there? If you want me to answer this question, you must go back with me, or rather think back with me, over many thousands of years; and, looking into this same Caribbean Sea, we shall find in its south-western part a little hill formed of mud and sand, and reaching not nearly so high as the top of the water. Not far from it float some little, soft, jelly-like bodies, exactly resembling the one who spoke to the star-fish just now. They are emigrants looking for a new home. They seem to take a fancy to this hill, and fix themselves on bits of rock along its base, until, as more and more of them come, they form a circle around it, and the hill stands up in the middle, while far above the whole blue waves are tossing in the sunlight.

How do you like this little circular town seen in the picture? It is the beginning of Coraltown, just as the landing of the Pilgrims at Plymouth was the beginning of Massachusetts. Now we will see how it grows. First of all, notice this curious fact, that each settler, after once choosing a home, never after stirs from that spot; but, from day to day, fastens himself more and more firmly to the rock where he first stuck. The part of his body touching the rock hardens into stone, and as the months and years go by, the sides of his body, too, turn to stone; and yet he is still alive, eating all the time with a little mouth at his top, taking in the sea-water without a strainer, and getting consequently tiny bits of lime in it, which, once taken in, go to build up the little body into a sort of limestone castle; just as if one of the knights in armor, of whom we read in old stories, had, instead of putting on his steel corselet and helmet and breastplate, turned his own flesh and bones into armor. How safe he would be! So these inhabitants of Coraltown were safe from all the fishes and other fierce devourers of little sea creatures (for who wants to swallow a mail-clad warrior, however small?); and their settlement was undisturbed, and grew from year to year, until it formed a pretty high wall.

But, before going any farther, you may like to know that these settlers were all of the polyp family: fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, uncles and aunts,--all were polyps. And this is the way their families increased: after the first comers were fairly settled, and pretty thoroughly turned to stone, little buds, looking somewhat like the smallest leaf-buds of the spring-time, began to grow out of their edges. These were their children, at least one kind of their children; for they had yet another kind also, coming from eggs, and floating off in the water like the first settlers. These latter we might call the free children or wanderers, while the former could be named the fixed children. But even the wanderers come back after a short time, and settle beside their parents, as you remember the one who met the star- fish was about to do.

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