1844-1858] NATURAL HISTORY 55 



I think I have evidence from the fossils of the boulder Letter 20 

 formations in Ireland that if such Miocene land existed 

 it must have been broken up or partially broken up at the 

 epoch of the glacial or boulder period. 

 All objections thankfully received. 



Ever most sincerely, 



EDWARD FORBES. 



To L. Jenyns (Blomefield). Letter 21 



Down. [1846]. 



I am much obliged for your note and kind intended 

 present of your volume. 1 I feel sure I shall like it, for all 

 discussions and observations on what the world would call 

 trifling points in Natural History always appear to me very 

 interesting. In such foreign periodicals as I have seen, 

 there are no such papers as White, or Waterton, or some 

 few other naturalists in London's and Charlesworth's Journal, 

 would have written ; and a great loss it has always appeared 

 to me. I should have much liked to have met you in London, 

 but I cannot leave home, as my wife is recovering from a 

 rather sharp fever attack, and I am myself slaving to finish 

 my S. American Geology, 2 of which, thanks to all Plutonic 

 powers, two-thirds are through the press, and then I shall 

 feel a comparatively free man. Have you any thoughts of 

 Southampton ? 3 I have some vague idea of going there, and 

 should much enjoy meeting you. 



To J. D. Hooker. Letter 22 



Shrewsbury [end of Feb. 1846]. 



I came here on account of my father's health, which has 

 been sadly failing of late, but to my great joy he has got 

 surprisingly better. ... I had not heard of your botanical 

 appointment, 4 and am very glad of it, more especially as it 

 will make you travel and give you change of work and relaxa- 

 tion. Will you some time have to examine the Chalk and its 



1 No doubt the late Mr. BlomefielcTs Observations in Natural History. 

 See Life and Letters, II., p. 31. 



2 Geological Observations in South America (London), 1846. 



3 The British Association met at Southampton in 1846. 



4 Sir Joseph was appointed Botanist to the Geological Survey in 1846. 



