452 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



of Dr. Wyville Thomson, F. R. S. (Professor of Natural History in 

 Edinburgh University by rights, but at present detached for duty in 

 partibus), whose business it is to turn all the wonderfully-packed stores 

 of appliances to account, and to accumulate, before the ship returns 

 to England, such additions to natural knowledge as shall justify the 

 labor and cost involved in the fitting out and maintenance of the ex- 

 pedition. 



Under the able and zealous superintendence of the hydrographer, 

 Admiral Richards, every precaution which experience and forethought 

 could devise has been taken to provide the expedition with the ma- 

 terial conditions of success ; and it would seem as if nothing short of 

 wreck or pestilence, both most improbable contingencies, could pre- 

 vent the Challenger from doing splendid work, and opening up a new 

 era in the history of scientific voyages. 



The dispatch of this expedition is the culmination of a series of 

 such enterprises, gradually increasing in magnitude and importance, 

 which the Admiralty, greatly to its credit, has carried out for some 

 years past ; and the history of which is given by Dr. Wyville Thom- 

 son in the beautifully-illustrated volume entitled " The Depths of the 

 Sea," published since his departure : 



" In the spring of the year 1868, my friend Dr. "W. B. Carpenter, at that 

 time one of the vice-presidents of the Eoyal Society, was with me in Ireland, 

 where we were working out together the structure and development of the 

 Crinoids. I had long previously had a profound conviction that the land of 

 promise for the naturalist, the only remaining region where there were endless 

 novelties of extraordinary interest ready to the hand which had the means of 

 gathering them, was the bottom of the deep sea. I had even had a glimpse of 

 some of these treasures, for I had seen, the year before, with Prof. Sars, the 

 forms which I have already mentioned, dredged by his son at a depth of 300 to 

 400 fathoms off the Loffoden Islands. I propounded my views to my fellow- 

 laborer, and we discussed the subject many times over our microscopes. I 

 strongly urged Dr. Carpenter to use his influence at headquarters to induce the 

 Admiralty, probably through the Council of the Eoyal Society, to give us the 

 use of a vessel properly fitted with a dredging-gear and all necessary scientific 

 apparatus, that many heavy questions as to the state of things in the depths of 

 the ocean, which were still in a state of uncertainty, might be definitely set- 

 tled. After full consideration, Dr. Carpenter promised his hearty cooperation, 

 and we agreed that I should write to him on his return to London, indicating 

 generally the results which I anticipated, and sketching out what I conceived 

 to be a promising line of inquiry. The Council of the Royal Society warmly 

 supported the proposal ; and I give here in chronological order the short and 

 eminently satisfactory correspondence which led to the Admiralty placing at 

 the disposal of Dr. Carpenter and myself the gunboat Lightning, under the 

 command of Staff-Commander May, E. N., in the summer of 1868, for a trial 

 cruise to the north of Scotland, and afterward to the much wider surveys in 

 H. M. S. Porcupine, Captain Calver, E. N., which were made with the addi- 

 tional association of Mr. Gwyn Jeffreys, in the summers of the years 1869 and 

 1870." 



1 " The Depths of the Sea," pp. 49, 50. 



