424 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM. vol. xxix. 



the fauna on this part of the coast. The expedition arrived in Bantry 

 Bay, August, 1780, on its return, and sailed thence for England; so it 

 is evident that these shells could hardly have come into the hands of 

 Martyn for figuring before the autumn of 1780. This fixes a date 

 anterior to which his plates could not have been made, to sa}^ nothing 

 of being published. Owing to the manner in which his plates were 

 made, it is obvious that (admitting that the}^ were bound by the pur- 

 chaser, as usual) variations might be expected in the number found 

 between one pair of covers; and that the extra plates of medals were 

 engraved and added to the others without reference to the time when 

 the first regular plates might have been issued. 



It is admitted on all hands that the first forty plates were issued as 

 early as 1784, and the citations in the Portland Catalogue show that 

 eighty plates were published and in use at the time, April, 1786, when 

 that catalogue was issued; moreover, the bibliography included in it 

 gives onlv the date 1784 for the whole eighty. 



Now, Mart}^! speaks in his preface (p. 34) of his first four medals 

 and states that an engraving of them stands at the head of his preface 

 (also issued separately as an advertisement), and this plate is dated 

 1788. He also saj's (p. 36) that at this time it is upwards of seven 

 years since he commenced the design of the work and that a principal 

 inducement was the number of new species he had purchased of 

 several officers ''then lately returned from the Pacific Ocean." The 

 expedition returned in the autumn of 1780; seven years and a half 

 would, if deducted from 1788, bring his purchases into the first half 

 of the year 1781. Three 3'ears and a half from the time of beginning, 

 Martyn tells us, "upwards of 70 copies of two volumes (80 plates) were 

 finished." This would bring the date of conclusion to 1784, which 

 agrees with the record. 



It is highl}'^ improbable that any one would proceed in the expensive 

 duplication of copies without to some extent advertising the project, 

 and, in accordance with a custom not 3'et wholly extinct, it is evident 

 he did so by sending copies to certain dignitaries — the King, the Pope, 

 and various foreign monarchs. The copies were doubtless, in accord- 

 ance with common sense, of the best he had, perhaps finished b}^ his 

 own hand. 



The testimony of the medals shows that he received a medal for two 

 successive years from Pope Sixtus, which we ma}' assume represented 

 his "volumes" 1 and II, or the first and second forty plates, which 

 therefore were in existence, respectivel}", in 1782 and 1783. 



After rejecting the bulk of the plates finished by 1784 in order to 

 bring the earlier made ones up to the standard of the later drawings, 

 there is a pause in the sequence of the medals, the next being dated 

 1785, which would correspond well enough to the time needed to bring 

 the series up to standard. 



