Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from The the Great Barrier Reef of Australia, Its Products and Potentialities: Containing an Account, With Copious Coloured and Photographic Illustrations (the Latter Here Produced for the First Time) Of the Corals and Coral Reefs, Pearl and Pearl-Shell, Bèche-De-Mer, Other Fishing Industries, and the Marine Fauna
Day dream Of the author, when attached, in years gone by, to the Natural History Department of the British Museum, and for the nonce engaged in the arrangement and nomenclature of the magnificent collection of Madrepores or Stony-corals in that Institution, was to be afforded an Opportunity of seeing those organisms growing in their native seas and in their wonderful living tints. That this day-dream, contrary to many of its order, has been substantially realised, this volume, to a large extent, bears witness. The impressions which the actual sight of growing coral-reefs yielded the author are here reproduced, with the fidelity that photography alone can compass, for the benefit of those who, possessing the desire, lack opportunity of making a personal acquaintance with this fairy-land of fact.
The motives of this volume are, at the same time, manifold. A primary object is to place the reading public generally, and the scientific world in particular, in possession of more extensive and accurate information than has hitherto been at their disposal, concerning the external features and the detailed composition of coral-reefs, as represented by that largest existing coral structure, the Great Barrier Reef of Australia; also to bring forward evidence bearing upon the opposing theories concerning the telluric conditions under which that vast reef originated.
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