ch. viii.] 18421854. 173 



out of some troubled dark region. So I must make the 

 best of my Cirripedia. . . ." 



October 1840. " I have of late been at work at mere 

 species describing, which is much more difficult than I ex- 

 pected, and has much the same sort of interest as a puzzle 

 has ; but I confess I often feel wearied with the work, and 

 cannot help sometimes asking myself what is the good of 

 spending a week or fortnight in ascertaining that certain 

 just perceptible differences blend together and constitute 

 varieties and not species. As long as I am on anatomy I 

 never feel myself in that disgusting, horrid, cui bo?io, in- 

 quiring humour. AVhat miserable work, again, it is search- 

 ing for priority of names. I have just finished two species, 

 which possess seven generic, and twenty-four specific names ! 

 Mv chief comfort is, that the work must be sometimes 

 done, and I may as well do it, as any one else. 



October 1852. " I am at work at the second volume of 

 the Cirripedia, of which creatures I am wonderfully tired. 

 I hate a Barnacle as no man evei did before, not even a 

 sailor in a slow-sailing ship. My first volume is out ; the 

 only part worth looking at is on the sexes of Ibla and Scal- 

 pellum. I hope by next summer to have done with my 

 tedious work." 



July 1853. " I am extremely glad to hear that you ap- 

 proved of my cirripeclial volume. I have spent an almost 

 ridiculous amount of labour on the subject, and certainly 

 would never have undertaken it had I foreseen what a job 

 it was." 



In September, 1854, his Cirripede work was practically 

 finished, and he wrote to Sir J. Hooker: 



" I have been frittering away my time for the last several 

 weeks in a wearisome manner, partly idleness, and odds and 

 ends, and sending ten thousand Barnacles * out of the house 

 all over the world. But I shall now in a day or two begin 

 to look over my old notes on species. What a deal I shall 

 have to discuss with you ; I shall have to look sharp that I 

 do not c progress ' into one of the greatest bores in life, to 

 the few like you with lots of knowledge." 



* The duplicate type-specimens of ray father's Cirripedes are in the Liv- 

 erpool Free Public i'luseum, as 1 learn from the Rev. H. H. Higgins. 



