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



placed in the hammock netting on the upper deck was filled as required, and the spirit 

 was drawn off from the tank by means of a pipe with a tap placed in the laboratory, 

 and secured under lock and key. The key was placed under special charge, especially at 

 night, as a precaution against danger from fire. 



In the case of any similar expedition in the future, it would be a great gain to have a 

 drying chamber of some kind provided. In damp weather in the tropics, and also in the 

 Southern Ocean and elsewhere, it was found extremely difficult to dry plants and other 

 objects satisfactorily. The plants had usually to be dried in the ship's oven when vacant 

 and cooling at night, or by being placed in the funnel casings, or in the stokehold. 

 It would have been easy to have partitioned off, by means of perforated sheet-iron, a 

 small drying chamber in the stokehold or elsewhere, where the hot air from the fires 

 passing through would have produced the required effect. It would, however, be better 

 if such a chamber could be provided with a separate source of heat of its own, to be used 

 when the boiler fires were not lighted. A drying apparatus thus arranged would be of 

 the greatest service for drying deposits, corals, sponges, and many animal specimens as 

 well as plants. The specimens put to dry, for lack of a better place, in the ovens, or in 

 the stokehold, were often, of necessity, inadvertently destroyed. 



A press with weights intended for use in drying plants was taken on board the ship, 

 but not used. It was fouud far better to use wire frames between the drying papers 

 as ventilators, and to employ straps or ropes placed round the bundles to produce the 

 requisite pressure. If plants be placed between single sheets of botanical drying paper, 

 and packed in bundles with a ventilator between each two sheets, they may be 

 successfully dried by means of artificial heat, without any change of the papers. 



A list of the instruments and apparatus taken on board the ship for natural history 

 purposes, which experience proved to be serviceable, is given in Appendix C to this 

 chapter. It may be well here to point out some of those items which were found 

 especially useful, and also to give a few words of warning as to those found useless. 



By far the most economical wide-mouthed bottles, and the most convenient 

 and handy in every way for use on a large scale, are known in the trade as " rock 

 bottles," manufactured for holding sweetmeats. They are made in three sizes, and 

 sold packed in wooden cases, with handles at each end and compartments for each 

 bottle, padded with cork. The bottles are all about the same height, 9 inches, made 

 of pale green, but very transparent, glass, and closed by glass stoppers with cork rims. 

 The diameters of the three sizes of bottles are 6. 4^, and 3f inches, with mouths 

 3f , 2f , and 2§ inches respectively. They are very cheap ; 200 cases complete, containing 

 2300 jars, were supplied to the Expedition by Messrs. E. Breffit & Co., Upper Thames 

 Street, London, at a cost of £70. 



Worth mentioning also, as especially useful and cheap, were roughly made bottles of 

 white glass, with ground glass stoppers, measuring 3^ inches in height, 2 inches in 



