1849.] WATER-CURE. 347 



and eat immensely, and am never oppressed with my food. 

 I have lost the involuntary twitching of the muscle, and all 

 the fainting feelings, &c — black spots before eyes, &c. Dr. 

 Gully thinks he shall quite cure me in six or nine months 

 more. 



The greatest bore, which I find in the water-cure, is the 

 having been compelled to give up all reading, except the 

 newspapers ; for my daily two and a half hours at the Bar- 

 nacles is fully as much as I can do of anything which occu- 

 pies the mind ; I am consequently terribly behind in all sci- 

 entific books. I have of late been at work at mere species 

 describing, which is much more difficult than I expected, and 

 has much the same sort of interest as a puzzle has ; but I 

 confess I often feel wearied with the work, and cannot help 

 sometimes asking myself what is the good of spending a week 

 or fortnight in ascertaining that certain just perceptible dif- 

 ferences blend together and constitute varieties and not 

 species. As long as I am on anatomy I never feel myself in 

 that disgusting, horrid, cui bono, inquiring, humour. What 

 miserable work, again, it is searching for priority of names. 

 I have just finished two species, which possess seven generic, 

 and twenty- four specific names! My chief comfort is, that 

 the work must be sometime done, and I may as well do it, as 

 any one else^ 



I have given up my agitation against ;;///// and fzobis j my 

 paper is too long to send to you, so you must see it, if you 

 care to do so, on your return. By-the-way, you say in your 

 letter that you care more for my species work than for the 

 Barnacles ; now this is too bad of you, for I declare your 

 decided approval of my plain Barnacle work over theoretic 

 species work, had very great influence in deciding me to go 

 on with the former, and defer my species paper. . . . 



[The following letter refers to the death of his little 

 daughter, which took place at Malvern on April 24, 1851 :] 



