xxxvi THE VOYAGE OF H.M.S. CHALLENGER. 



the waves on reading Edward Forbes' enthusiastic description of his first deep-water 

 dredging : — 



" Beneath the waves there are many dominions yet to be visited and kingdoms to be 

 discovered, and he who venturously brings up from the abyss enough of their inhabitants 

 to display the physiognomy of the country, will taste that cup of delight, the sweetness 

 of whose draught those only who have made a discovery know. Well do I remember the 

 first day when I saw the dredge hauled up after it had been dragging along the sea 

 bottom, at a depth of more than 1 00 fathoms. Fishing lines had now and then entangled 

 creatures at as great, and greater depths, but these were few and far between, and only 

 served to whet our curiosity, without affording the information we thirsted for. They 

 were like the few stray bodies of strange red men which tradition reports to have been 

 washed on the shores of the Old World, before the discovery of the New, and which 

 served to indicate the existence of unexplored realms inhabited by unknown races, but 

 not to supply information about their character, habits, and extent. But when a whole 

 dredgeful of living creatures from the unexplored depth appealed, it was as if we had 

 lighted upon a city of the unknown people, and were able, through the numbers and 

 varieties taken, to understand what manner of beings they were. Well do I remember 

 anxiously separating every trace of organic life from the enveloping mud, and gazing 

 with delighted eye on creatures hitherto unknown, or on groups of living shapes, the , 

 true habitats of which had never been ascertained before, nor had their aspect, when 

 in the full vigour and beauty of life, ever before delighted the eye of a naturalist. 

 And when, at close of day, our active labours over, we counted the bodies of 

 the slain, or curiously watched the proceedings of those whom we had selected as 

 prisoners, and confined in crystal vases, filled with a limited allowance of their native 

 element, our feebngs of exultation were as vivid, and surely as pardonable, as the 

 triumphant satisfaction of some old Spanish ' Conquisatador,' musing over his siege of 

 a wondrous Astlan 1 city, and reckoning the number of painted Indians he had brought 

 to the ground by the prowess of his stalwart arm." 2 



Dredging in shallow water was found to be so easy, and its results so interesting, and 

 often so unexpected, that it soon became popular among naturalists, and assisted in 

 turning their attention more particularly to marine life. 



The increased interest in the biological conditions was accompanied by a more careful 

 study of the physical and chemical problems presented by sea water. A great many 

 analyses were made towards the end of last century, but the methods then employed 

 were too imperfect to yield results of much scientific value, and the principle on which 

 they were conducted was erroneous. It was assumed that a proximate analysis of the 

 salts in sea water could be made by weighing the amount of each particular salt that could 



1 Astlan was the country from which, according to native tradition, the Aztecs came, 

 a Natural History of European Seas, p. 11, 1859. 



