Part 26 (1/2)

How is the Caoutchouc obtained fro incisions in the trunk of the tree, fro of aof a dark reddish color, soft and elastic to the touch

To what use is this substance put?

The Indians make of it boots, shoes, bottles, flast us it is co the vulcanized rubber of coreater proportion of sulphur, produces vulcanite, a hard black substance, reseht

What is Sponge?

Ato rocks and shells under the sea-water, or on the sides of rocks near the shore Sponge was foretable production; by others, a mineral, or a collection of sea-mud, but it has since been discovered to be the fabric and habitation of a species of worm, or polypus

What do you mean by Polypus?

A species of ani such an admixture of the characteristics of both plants and animals, as to render it difficult to decide to which division they properly belong They are animal in substance, possessed indeed of a stomach, but without the other anians of sense; these creatures live chiefly in water, and are mostly incapable of motion: they increase by buds or excrescences froain anda perfect animal Myriads of the different species of zoophytes reside in se, &c, or in forms like plants, and multiply in such numbers as to create rocks and whole islands in nifies having many feet, or roots; it is derived from the Greek

_Myriads_, countless nues brought?

From the Mediterranean, especially from Nicaria, an island near the coast of Asia: the collection of sponges forms, in some of these islands, the principal support of their inhabitants They are procured by diving under water, an exercise in which both men, women, and children are skilled froes are esteeer and coarser sorts are brought froe is very useful in the arts, as well as for domestic purposes

What is Coral?

A substance which, like sponge, was considered as a vegetable production, until about the year 1720, when a French gentleman of Marseilles commenced (and continued for thirty years,) a series of observations, and ascertained that the coral was a living anieneral name of zoophytes, or plant animals, has since been applied to the a milky juice; this juice, when exuded from the animal, becomes fixed and hard

_Series_, a course or continued succession

_Glands_, vessels

_Exuded_, from exude, to flow out

Is this substance considered by naturalists as the habitation of the Insect?

Not merely as the habitation, but as a part of the animal itself, in the same manner that the shell of a snail or an oyster is of those ani exist By means of this juice or secretion, the coral insects, at a vast but unknown depth below the surface of the sea, attach thees of rocks, which form the bottom of the ocean; upon which foundation the little architects labor, building up, by the aid of the above-mentioned secretion, pile upon pile of their rocky habitations, until at length the work rises above the sea, and is continued to such a height as to leave it al on that part, and begin afresh in another direction under the water Huge masses of rocky substances are thus raised by this wonderful little insect, capable of resisting the trehest pitch by winds or tempests

_Architect_, one who builds

How do these Coral Rocks become Islands?

After the for tide, are broken and ether by the action of the waves; these, in tiher and higher; meanwhile, the ever-active surf continues to throw up the shells of marine animals and other substances, which fill up the crevices between the stones; the undisturbed sand on its surface offers to the seeds of trees and plants cast upon it by the waves, a soil upon which they rapidly grow and overshadow the dazzling whiteness of the new-formed land Trunks of trees, washed into the sea by the rivers fro-place, and with these come some small animals, chiefly of the lizard and insect tribe