ently
in any shape into which it may be fashioned. As to Magones, it seems
another Iceland; for there are the same wild and hideous desolation,
the same impassable wildernesses, and the same universal scenes of
ruin, lighted up by the baleful and tremendous volcanic fires."

"But what of that little island on which they landed?" asked
Featherstone. "That, surely, was not volcanic."

"No," said the doctor; "that must have been a coral island."

"By-the-bye, is it really true," asked Featherstone, "that these coral
islands are the work of little insects?"

"Well, they may be called insects," replied the doctor; "they are
living zoophytes of most minute dimensions, which, however, compensate
for their smallness of size by their inconceivable numbers. Small as
these are they have accomplished infinitely more than all that ever
was done by the ichthyosaurus, the plesiosaurus, the pterodactyl, and
the whole tribe of monsters that once filled the earth. Immense
districts and whole mountains have been built up by these minute
creatures. They have been at work for ages, and are still at work. It
is principally in the South Seas that their labors are carried on.
Near the Maldive Islands they have formed a mass whose volume is equal
to the Alps. Around New Caledonia they have built a barrier of reefs
four hundred miles in length, and another along the northeast coast of
Australia a thousand miles in length. In the Pacific Ocean, islands,
reefs, and islets innumerable have been constructed by them, which
extend for an immense distance.

"The coral islands are called 'atolls.' They are nearly always
circular, with a depression in the centre. They are originally made
ring-shaped, but the action of the ocean serves to throw fragments of
rock into the inner depression, which thus fills up; firm land
appears; the rock crumbles into soil; the winds and birds and currents
bring seeds here, and soon the new island is covered with verdure.
These little creatures have played a part in the past quite as
important as in the present. All Germany rests upon a bank of coral;
and they seem to have been most active during the Oolitic Period."

"How do the creatures act?" asked Featherstone.

"Nobody knows," replied the doctor.

A silence now followed, which was at last broken by Oxenden.

"After all," said he, "these monsters and marvels of nature form the
least interesting feature in the land of the Kosekin. To me the people
themselves