CHAPTER XVIL 

 ROBERT DICK AND CHARLES PEACH 



A SUCCESSION of visits from Peach to Dick, and a long 

 correspondence between them, followed their first intro- 

 duction. Peach travelled a great deal, especially during 

 the shipwrecking season ; and when in the neighbourhood 

 of Thurso it was his invariable practice to call upon his 

 friend Dick. They communicated to each other all that 

 they had found since their last meeting, and they often 

 sent parcels of shells and fossils by the carrier's cart, 

 with numerous communications, to ask each other's 

 opinion about their special findings. 



Shortly after Peach's first visit to Thurso, he found a 

 specimen of a new fossil fish which he thought allied to 

 the Dipterus. It was a bony fish. He consulted Dick 

 on the subject. Dick thought it very unusual ; and 

 " from the resemblance (he said) which it bears to the 

 vertebral column of the Coccosteus, fragments of which 

 are commonly attached to its buckler, I should, for my 

 part, have no hesitation in pronouncing it what you take 

 it to be.* Cartilage becomes petrified, and in some for- 

 mations cartilaginous fish are found. But your speci- 



* For description of this bony fish see Decade X. Geological Survey, 

 Parts iv. v. p. 51. 



