But the air of these climates had so enervating an influence that man, absorbed by present enjoyment, was rendered regardless of the future.
[Footnote e: Malte Brun tells us (vol.v.p.

726) that the water of the Caribbean Sea is so transparent that corals and fish are discernible at a depth of sixty fathoms.

The ship seemed to float in air, the navigator became giddy as his eye penetrated through the crystal flood, and beheld submarine gardens, or beds of shells, or gilded fishes gliding among tufts and thickets of seaweed.] [Footnote f: See Appendix, B.] North America appeared under a very different aspect; there everything was grave, serious, and solemn: it seemed created to be the domain of intelligence, as the South was that of sensual delight.

A turbulent and foggy ocean washed its shores.

It was girt round by a belt of granite rocks, or by wide tracts of sand.