LITERARY WORK IN DEVONSHIRE. 285 



facts connected with this inquiry formed the main occupa- 

 tion of my father's time. In 1852 he had enjoyed his first 

 experience of marine-collecting on the shores of Oddicombe 

 and Petit Tor, and he now returned to the same pools and 

 coves with a fuller experience. He found the coast but 

 little interfered with, although the aquarium mania and 

 the prestige of his previous visit had to some degree 

 invaded his hunting-grounds. In carrying through the 

 great task w^hich he had set before him, a task in which no 

 predecessor had laid down the lines along which he was to 

 proceed, he found it absolutely necessary to base every 

 single observation on personal examination. In order to 

 do this, he was obliged to provide himself with a wide 

 variety of specimens, and to appeal to local naturalists 

 in all parts of the British Islands for help. He printed a 

 circular inviting the co-operation of strangers, in which he 

 described, with minute care, what he w^anted and did not 

 want, how specimens should be packed and forwarded, and 

 all other needful particulars. The consequence was that 

 he stimulated the zeal of fellow-labourers in all parts of 

 Britain, from the Shetlands to Jersey, and the morning 

 post commonly laid upon the breakfast-table at Sandhurst 

 one, if not more, little box of a salt and oozy character, 

 containing living anemones or corals carefully wrapped up 

 in wet seaweed. In those days, fortunately, the Post 

 Office had not yet wakened up to the inconvenience to 

 other people's correspondence which such dribbling 

 packages might cause. 



But it w^as to his own exertions that Philip Gosse mainly 

 looked for the necessary specimens. Several times a week, 

 if the weather and the tide were at all favourable, he would 

 clamber down to the shore at Anstice Cove, at Oddicombe, 

 at Petit Tor, or take longer excursions, to Maidencombe 

 northwards, or to Livermead southwards on Tor Bay. In 



