DEEP-SEA RESEARCHES. 93 



To Mrs. Carpenter. 



On board the Lightning, September 6, 1S68. 

 This morning, after two days' interdiction, we had our most 

 interesting result. At 530 fathoms the temperature was 47° 

 (probably on account of the Gulf Stream), and we have brought 

 up in a muddy ooze a most remarkable set of new and large 

 forms of siliceous sponges, with which Thomson is especially 

 delighted, together with others previously discovered and re- 

 cently described by Loven, as well as small specimens of the 

 Hyalonema (Japanese flint-rope) and its encrusting Polype ; the 

 whole giving materials for completely settling the questions lately 

 discussed between Gray and Bowerbank, in which Thomson has 

 intervened, and (as at present appears) entirely in favour of 

 Thomson's views. He is, of course, greatly delighted, and now 

 says that it was quite worth a week's misery to get these. 



September 7. 

 After I wrote yesterday afternoon, we had the intense satis- 

 faction of meeting with two specimens of jRhizocriims, not very 

 good ones, but serving to prove the existence of this type in the 

 open ocean, and therefore (presumably) in considerable quanti- 

 ties, if we can only hit upon the spots where it abounds, as we 

 have fortimately done with the sponges. This completes the 

 success of our expedition in everything that we hoped to do, 

 except that the zoology of the Faroe fjords proved much less 

 interesting than we had anticipated. We have proved that dredg- 

 ing at 500 or 550 fathoms involves no more difficulty, where 

 there is adequate power, than dredging at 100 fathoms. We 

 have found out the best form of dredge and the best material 

 for the bag. We have got all the Norwegian forms to which we 

 alluded in our letters as carrying us back to older types. We 

 have added a great deal to our knowledge of geographical dis- 

 tribution, and have shown how much more it depends on the 

 temperature than on the pressure of the deep sea ; and we 

 have a set of observations on this subject which are of first- 

 rale importance. As complete novelties from 500 fathoms and 

 more, we have not only the series of siliceous sponges, but also 



