H.M.S. Challenger. 



CHAPTER I. 



Selection of H.M.S. Challenger — Her Fittings — Description of the Decks, Workrooms, and Laboratories— List of 

 Officers — Departure from Sheerness — Arrival at Portsmouth — Appendices. 



THE deep-sea investigations conducted on board H.M. Ships "Lightning," "Porcupine," 

 and "Shearwater," in the years 1868, 1869, 1870 and 1871, and the subsequent 

 correspondence between the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, the Council of the 

 Royal Society, and Dr. W. B. Carpenter, C.B., F.R.S., have been referred to in the pre- 

 ceding introductory chapter. 



The practical outcome of these preliminary expeditions and negotiations was the 

 decision by the Government and the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty to equip an 

 Expedition for the examination of the physical and biological conditions of the deep sea 

 throughout the great ocean basins. The proposal to defray the expense of such an 

 Expedition out of the public funds received the cordial assent of the House of Commons 

 in April 1872. 



The work connected with the despatch of the Expedition from England was at once 

 vigorously taken up by Admiral G. H. Richards, at that time Hydrographer to the 

 Admiralty. H.M.S. Challenger, a steam corvette, with a spar upper deck, of 2306 tons 

 displacement, and an indicated power of 1234 horses, was chosen for this service. 

 Captain George Strong Nares, an experienced surveying officer, was selected by the Lords 

 Commissioners of the Admiralty to take command of the Expedition. Captain Nares 

 received his appointment to the Challenger in May 1872, and all the arrangements 

 and fittings which were necessary in order to make the ship suitable for the peculiar 



(naer. chall. exp. — vol. i. — 1884.) 1 



