10 INTRODUCTION. 



examination was concluded it was found that in his written 

 answers he had not been very successful ; he had not even acquitted 

 himself so well as in the Tripos of the year before, and had the 

 election been determined by the results of the examination 

 alone, the examiners would have been led to choose the gentle- 

 man who was Balfour's only competitor. The original work 

 however which Balfour sent in, including a preliminary account 

 of the discoveries made at Naples, was obviously of so high a 

 merit and was spoken of in such enthusiastic terms by the 

 External Referee Prof. Huxley, that the examiners did not hesi- 

 tate for a moment to neglect altogether the formal written 

 answers (and indeed the papers of questions were only intro- 

 duced as a safeguard, or as a resource in case evidence of 

 original power should be wanted) and unanimously recom- 

 mended him for election. Accordingly he was elected Fellow 

 in the early days of October. 



Almost immediately after, the little book on Embryology 

 appeared, on which he and I had been at work, he doing 

 his share even while his hands and mind were full of the Elas- 

 mobranch inquiry. The title-page was kept back some little 

 time in order that his name might appear on it with the 

 addition of Fellow of Trinity, a title of which he was then, and 

 indeed always continued to be, proud. He also published in 

 the October number of the Quarterly Journal of Microscopi- 

 cal Science a preliminary account of his Elasmobranch re- 

 searches. 



He and his friends thought that after these almost inces- 

 sant labours, and the excitement necessarily contingent upon 

 the fellowship election, he needed rest and change. Ac- 

 cordingly on the i /th of October he started with his friend 

 Marlborough Pryor on a voyage to the west coast of South 

 America. They travelled thither by the Isthmus of Panama, 

 visited Peru and Chili, and returned home along the usual 

 route by the Horn ; reaching England some time in Feb. 

 1875. 



Refreshed by this holiday, he now felt anxious to complete 

 as far as possible his Elasmobranch work, and very soon after 

 his return home, in fact in March, made his way again to 

 Naples, where he remained till the hot weather set in in May. 



