No flower garden was ever more exquisitely varied, both as to form and colour, than the scene under the water. The coral itself, standing up in the forms of shrubs, wheat-sheaves, mushrooms, stags'-horns, cabbages, and cauliflowers, was mostly covered with millions of the little polypes, displaying their graceful rosettes of green, purple, yellow, brown and white. Among these were strewn innumerable shells from the smallest to the largest, and amongst the most conspicuous were the gigantic clams, of which many specimens weigh hundreds of pounds. Then there were seen fish darting in and out as they "With quick glance, Showed to the Sun their waved coats dropt with gold," the variegated Zebra fish, and a hundred other species, often popping up from deep holes and caves, of which we could not see the bottom. All seemed life, beauty, and enjoyment, and when I had looked at it a long time, it brought to my mind the time when God looked upon what he had formed, and said that it was good, for you could not wish anything to be different from what it was; the scene appeared faultless, and quite filled up the heart with emotions of love and beauty. This reef was one of those which surrounded a good-sized island. The cut will show you nearly how it appeared to be situated in regard to the land; _a_ is the land; _b_ the coral; and _c_ the Lagoon, the width of which was about a quarter of a mile. [Illustration] There were in it several masses of coral of a very curious shape, such as I have since found always exist in Lagoons. They are first built up in the form of a sugar-loaf, and when they get up somewhere between high and low-water-mark, the polypes extend them at the sides so as to make a sort of mushroom top, closely resembling the stones which farmers place ricks upon, to keep them out of the way of rats and mice. Their constructing these rocks in the sugar-loaf form, so as to make them as firm as possible, is a proof that the labours of the polypes are directed by a common instinct, and that each one does not do as he likes, without regard to the rest. I suppose the reason why they spread them out at top, is because they love best the highest habitations they can get, that are not quite out of the water; and therefore as many polypes as can, make their residences there. As the tide went down, a considerable space of the shore of the reef was left dry, towards the Lagoon, where it slanted off gently. Upon this there were some of the large clam shells, such as you saw a cut of just now. They generally lay about half open, but they would occasionally shut their shells together with a loud report, and then spout up a stream of water three or four feet high. We boiled one of these fish and tasted it, but found it very disagreeable. The fish weighed about four pounds, and the shell about fifty. There were many of a much larger size.