Difficult Dredging. 285 



find a considerable difference in the microscopic 

 fauna from what they had met with on the east of 

 England or in Scotch waters. In this they were 

 disappointed. To their surprise, the agreement ex- 

 tended even to the brackish water-pools. 



In other respects the results were not very satis^ 

 factory. On the beach they found but few shells, 

 and no zoophytes. The shores of granitic sand were 

 barren, not showing various zones of life between 

 tide marks ; and dredging in the shallow water near 

 the shore was almost equally unproductive. Dredging 

 in deeper water was much impeded. The dredge 

 was often held fast, and more than once the net was 

 torn asunder. This was not so much due to passing 

 over rocky ground as to the presence of an annelid 

 with a concretionary tube, which, from the abundance 

 of the fragments that they hauled up, seemed to form 

 a continuous floor. They obtained some specimens 

 of the stony coral, Caryophyllia Smithii, with the 

 young ones budding out from the side. 



After their return home there was much work to 

 be done in " floating " the various dredgings for ostra- 

 coda and entomostraca. In one department they 

 had some fairly good success, for on July 28, 1873, 

 Robertson writes to Brady : 



" Mrs. Robertson has been looking over the fora- 

 minifera. They appear to turn out very well in 

 species. One or two may be abundant, while most 

 of the others are thinly dispersed. In this shore- 

 gathering twelve species are represented by one 

 specimen each. But on the whole they are a nice 

 group. A few agree well with figures of D'Orbigny's 



