They scold every boat, affront passing steamers, and comport
themselves generally as if on the assurance of counsel's opinion on the
legality of their trespass.
And so it has come to pass, that the example of the uninfluential
Beachcomber, in the establishment of an informal and unofficial refuge
for birds, has been warranted and confirmed by the laws of the country. A
proclamation in those terms, those good set terms, which time and custom
approve, forbids shooting on this and two neighbouring groups of islands.
Is there not excuse in this flattery for just a little vainglory?
CHAPTER IV
GARDEN OF CORAL
Brammo Bay has its garden of coral--a border of pretty, quaint and varied
growth springing up along the verge of deep water. It is not as it used
to be--no less lovely than a flower-garden of the land. Terrestrial storms
work as much if not greater havoc in the shallow places of the sea as on
the land. Pearl-shell divers assert that ordinary "rough weather" is
imperceptible at a depth of two fathoms; while ten fathoms are generally
accepted as the extreme limit of wave action, however violent the surface
commotion. Yet in the shallow sea, within the Barrier Reef in times of
storm and stress, not only are groves of marine plants torn and wrenched
up, but huge lumps of coral rock are shattered or thrown bodily out of
place and piled up on "uproarious beaches.
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