About Coral
“UNCLE BOB has just returned from California,” said the boy named Billy, “and has brought Big Sister a necklace of very beautiful coral beads; not a bit like the dark red branchy looking ones that she has had since she was a baby! These are rose pink with little hand-carved roses all over them. What sort of a stone is coral, and where is it found? It’s lovely!”
“Strictly speaking,” said Somebody, “although coral has all the appearance of stone it isn’t that at all, although it is just as dangerous to a ship to run aground on a reef of it as it would be to run on the rocks—it’s so jagged and sharp. It is really the bones you might say of living creatures which made their homes in that particular spot for ages and dying have left their skeletons behind them for a monument.
“These little sea animals are called polyps and the coral grows inside their soft outer structure just as your bones do inside your flesh. Among the greatest architects in the world are the little coral-making animals, creatures of shallow water in the warmer seas. Some kinds live all alone, but the commoner ones live in colonies of many individuals united by a stalk with many branches—sort of a family tree you might say—indeed they were once called plant animals. They have a very helpful and economical way of living,” went on Somebody, “for when something good to eat swims or floats within reach of one little polyp’s mouth he sucks it in, swallows it, and all his hungry relatives get the benefit of it.”
“That’s what I’d call being real chummy,” said the boy named Billy. “How do they manage that?”
“They have a sort of family stomach,” said Somebody, “or reservoir into which all food absorbed by the colony goes.”
“I don’t believe I’d like that very well,” said Billy. “One fellow might have to eat all the things he didn’t care about and another would get all the pie.”
“I do not suppose the polyp has much to boast of in the way of the sense of taste,” laughed Somebody, “but you’ve got to admit that he does his duty as he sees it without shirking.”
“I should say he does,” said Billy. “What else does he do besides working for the good of his family?”
“He has a quite important hand in making the ‘beauteous land,’” said Somebody. “The Great Barrier Reef of Australia, extending a thousand miles along the coast and in some places from one to three miles wide, was made entirely by the Polyps. Also the keys of Florida, as well as the Everglades, are made entirely upon coral foundation.”
“That is very interesting,” said the boy named Billy. “But if there is so much of it why is it so expensive?”
“There’s only one kind that is precious,” said Somebody. “That is the corallium rubrum of the Mediterranean Sea. It was once supposed to be endowed with sacred properties of a mysterious nature; the Mandarins of China wear coral buttons made from it as their badge of office. There is also a very rare black coral which makes its home in the warm water of the Great Australian Barrier Reef. The Italians are the greatest coral workers, making a most valuable industry of making jewelry and buttons and other small articles.
“There’s a lot more to learn about this subject, but that’s all I am able to tell you just now,” said Somebody.
“Thanks,” said the boy named Billy. “I’ll read up on it.”
The Star-spangled Banner
FRANCIS SCOTT KEY
THE boy named Billy came running into the house one morning, full of the joy of living and singing at the top of his voice, “O, long may the star-spangled banner still wave, o’er the land of the free-ee and the home of the brave.”
“Get a step-ladder, Billy. You’ll never reach that ‘land of the free’ any other way,” advised Big Sister.
“Well, say,” said Billy grinning, “I’m not a prima donna; it takes a real voice to climb up there. I love it, but I wish there were not so many high places in it. Francis Scott Key never thought of me when he wrote it, that’s sure.”
“Francis Scott Key hadn’t a thing to do with it, silly-Billy,” said Big Sister. “How do you learn your history anyhow?”
“Well, Somebody, please tell me who did write it then?” asked Billy. “That’s what teacher said anyway.”
“Perhaps it was not made quite clear to you, Billy Boy, that the words only were written by Francis Scott Key. You’re not alone in wishing that it was not quite so difficult; when I come to that high note I always stand on tiptoe and I’ve never struck it yet, and nine out of ten people have the same difficulty; yet I love it, as we all do.
When we were at war with England
“As to who really wrote it there seems to be no clear record, some crediting it to Dr. Samuel Arnold, an Englishman, but others claim it for John Stafford Smith, who made it over from an old French composition. Anyway, it was used as a popular song in England for some years and was used in other ways also.
“In 1798 it was used by Robert Treat Paine in a political way, for a song called ‘Adams and Liberty.’
“Everyone knows how the words came to be written. It was in the Summer of 1814 when we were at war with England; the British under General Ross appeared in the vicinity of Washington and after overcoming feeble resistance took the capital and set fire to the White House and some other public buildings. The President and the Cabinet fled, while pretty Dolly Madison bundled up the most precious White House treasures, including Washington’s picture and the original draft of the Declaration of Independence and carried them to safety. Then the British prepared to bombard Baltimore from the sea and attack it from the land side. Francis Scott Key was sent with a friend to the British Fleet to get a prisoner of war. As the British were about to attack the town and the Fort he was not allowed to return, and you may imagine how anxiously he watched for the dawn to come and with what joy, when the mists rolled away that he beheld the starry banner still flying from the fort. With the tears of thankfulness streaming down his cheeks he wrote the first stanza of his now world-famous song and later in the day, when he had returned to the city, he finished the poem.
“It was first printed under the name of ‘The Bombardment of Fort McHenry,’ in the Baltimore American and immediately became very popular.”
“It’s a great song,” said the boy named Billy, “but I think almost anyone could have written a great song under those conditions—if he could write at all.”
“Yes indeed,” agreed Somebody.