XIV MEMOIR. 



considerable number of eggs from that gentleman early in Mareh 

 1844. Of liis other doings in tliat year I have little information; 

 but he continued to keep his terms at Cambridge, and early m June 

 repeated his visit to the Whittlesey Mere district, spending five days 

 at Sawtry (§290). 



For the greater part of 1845 particulars also fail me; but this was 

 a very important period in his career. Not only was it marked by 

 his first published contributions to natural history (Zoologist, pp. 887, 

 944, and 952), all written from Cambridge in the early part of the 

 year ; but after eutomologizing at the end of June in Wicken Fen, 

 and again staying at Sawtry for half of July (as Mr. Wolley-Dod, who 

 accompanied him, informs me), towards the close of summer he made 

 a voyage to the South of Spain. Having visited Cadiz and ascended 

 the Guadalquivir to Seville (Zoologist, pp. 1213, 1214), he crossed from 

 Gibraltar to Tangier. Here he unexpectedly found domiciled a keen 

 egg-collector (§ 1), at that time known to few naturalists in Europe 

 and perhaps to none in England. The discovery of M. Favier and 

 the treasures he possessed may be said to have been the turning- 

 point of Wolley's life. Hitherto Entomology had been his chief 

 pursuit, but from this time forward, though never wholly abandoned, 

 it \iekled its place to Oology, and the specimens he obtained in 

 Morocco at once placed his cabinet in the first rank, so that other 

 egg-collectors Avcre only too glad to share, by exchange, in his 

 Tangerine spoils which he from time to time continued to receive. 

 When his own wants and those of his immediate friends or corre- 

 spondents were satisfied, and in those days such wants were compara- 

 tively moderate, an intercourse, promoted I believe by him, between 

 Favier and Williams, a well-known dealer iu Oxford Street, served to 

 supply the general public with the coveted treasures. It is true that 

 the eggs thus rendered attainable were such as have long since been 

 accounted common, but the progress of the study is marked by the 

 fact that an ornithologist of the experience of Mr. Yarrell considered 

 those of the Pratincole and the Stilt-Plover brought home by Wolley 

 to be " the rarest he had ever seen " *. Mr, Hewitson was thereby 



* Yet Yarrell in 1841 (British Birds, ed. 1, iii. p. o) had already given a 

 -woodcut of a Pratincole's egg-, brought from Tangier by Mr. G. W. II. Drunimoud 

 Ilay (cf. Proc. Zool. Soc. 1840, p. 134). 



