WORK AT THE SEASHORE. 253 



which it was lavishly adorned were so costly that no 

 publisher would have faced the risk of their production, 

 the profit on the sale of the volume amounted, in pro- 

 cess of time, to more than ;^900. From Tenby Gosse 

 wrote as follows to Charles Kingsley (June 29, 1854) :— 

 " A most lovely place this is : I know not whether to 

 ''admire most the inland scenery, the noble cliffs and 

 "headlands and caverns of the coast line, or the pro- 

 " fusion of marine animals which I meet with. It is by 

 " far the most prolific place for the naturalist that I have 

 "explored, and I expect to get some treasures here. 

 ''The ^^xoXXy Actinia nivea that I described from a speci- 

 "men found at Petit Tor is here the characteristic 

 " species, occurring by hundreds ; and there is a most 

 " charming variety (if it be not indeed specifically dis- 

 "tinct) which has the whole disc of a miniate or orange 

 " hue, very brilliant, and the tentacles pure white." 

 The Aquarium was made the peg upon which, in No- 

 vember, 1854, Kingsley hung an article in the North 

 British Review, afterwards (May, 1855) enlarged and pub- 

 lished as the charming little volume called Glaucus ; or, the 

 Wonders of the Shore, through the pages of which the 

 lilies of my father's praise are sprinkled from full hands. 



Bowerbank had in 1852 assured Philip Gosse that he 

 would find Tenby ''the prince of places for a naturalist," 

 and Pembrokeshire, though now first visited, had never 

 been absent from his mind. The very first evening, after 

 securing lodgings, the family strolled out at low tide to 

 the island of St. Catherine, and the naturalist saw enough 

 to assure him that "its honeycombed rocks and dark 

 weedy basins are full of promise for to-morrow." A few 

 days afterwards, he wrote to Bowerbank that " the zoologi- 

 cal riches of these perforated caverns amply bear out your 

 laudatory testimony ; indeed, I have not met with any 



