8 DUBLIN UNIVERSITY 



the cause, and found he held in his hand a live lizzard, which he took 

 every opportunity of looking at, and playing with, under the table. 



Among his peta was a kite, which had been brought to him with 

 a broken leg. He made a wooden^one, and this answered so well 

 that his feathered favourite hopped about on it long afterwards at 

 Youghal. 



He was remarkable from his earliest childhood for his truthfulness. 

 Once only he was punished by his father, in consequence of his being 

 suspected of breaking a valued rose-tree. He positively denied the act, 

 though he bore the punishment quietly ; the following day the true 

 culprit was discovered. 



When nine years old he was sent to the Rev. Dr. Stewart's school, 

 at Clonakilty, county of Cork. That his observant faculties were then 

 active may be inferred from a passage in one of his letters to his friend, 

 the late William Thompson, Esq., of Belfast, dated March 3, 1840 : — 

 " I have told you before that I found two shells (Physa), when nijje 

 years old, near Clonakilty, which I deposited in my little cabinet at 

 vacation time." 



Another instance of the same characteristic, which occurred when 

 he was a year older, is narrated in a letter to the same friend, dated 

 December, 1839 : — " When a boy I remember watching a turtle resting 

 on the surface of the water in the harbour of Cove ; it went down on 

 coming near it." 



Perhaps, however, the most striking instance of his early powers of 

 observation is that which he himself afterwards communicated to the 

 Dublin University Zoological and Botanical Association : — 



"I recollect, when I was but a child, the many delightful days I 

 spent in examining animals on the shore, and I am conscious of having 

 at that time seen many rare species, not a few of which have since been 

 brought forward as recent discoveries. I may instance one, — the 

 Cydippe pomiformis, which I distinctly recollect to have seen when I 

 was not five years old. I found it in a pool, and brought it to my 

 father as the lens of a haddock's eye, which had come to life. I quite 

 remember its cilia and iridescence, and how deeply I was absorbed by 

 its beauty."— (Nov. 16, 1855.) 



He was afterwards transferred to the school of Mr. James White, at 

 Ballitore, county of Kildare. This gentleman had tastes in some re- 

 spects congenial to his own, and was therefore disposed to encourage 



