Page:The ocean and its wonders.djvu/239

 He therefore landed, and, on reaching the largest crater, found it to be full of boiling water, which over-flowed 'and found its way to the ocean in a river of about six yards in width. This island, however, was not a permanent addition to the world's archipelago. It sank into the ocean again, and disappeared in October of the same year in which it rose.

In commencing this little book we set out with the intention of rambling hither and thither, among things that relate to the sea, without regard to order. We have carried out our intention; and now, at the close of our task, find that the more we listen to the Ocean's Voice, the more we find its tale to be interminable, though the reverse of uninteresting.

In these rambles we have sought to treat chiefly of those scientific facts relating to the sea and the atmospheric ocean, which are not so frequently made the subject of books for the young, as are the wild and daring deeds of man upon the surface of the mighty deep.

It is not sufficient that man should become acquainted with the doings of his fellows on the sea. This is but one branch of general knowledge, and a very secondary one compared with that infinitely higher branch which treats of the workings of the Almighty in the ocean; workings which render it what it isnot merely a means of commercial enterprise for man and a home for fish,