Page:Neuroomia.djvu/230

218 rest in the land of their adoption; but the city they had founded grew and prospered, and promises, at no distant date, to rival Tehana itself."

"The rock has doubtless been removed," I observed.

"No," was the reply. "It crumbled away, and actually dissolved, by some peculiar and latent agency at present not understood by us. As for the whirlpool, its influence has long ceased to be felt."

"Are there many different kinds of rock in the sea?" I asked.

"Only three," was the answer. "First we have volcanic, like the one in question, then sandstone, but the hardest and most dangerous is that formed by the labours of a small marine insect."

"Coral rocks," I exclaimed. "Why! I had no idea they existed here. In some instances they take interesting and beautiful shapes, resembling plants and other objects, beneath the waters of our warmer seas."

"They alike do the same here," he observed. "And you may see many specimens to the collection I have added to the Geographical Department at Atazatlan."

Here we parted, and I returned to the library