378 LIFE AT DOWN. ^iTAT. 33-4$. [1849. 



the other day I got the curious case of a unisexual, instead of 

 hermaphrodite cirripede, in which the female had the common 

 cirripedial character, and in two valves of her shell had two 

 little pockets, in each of which she kept a little husband ; I do 

 not know of any other case where a female invariably has two 

 husbands. I have one still odder fact, common to several 

 species, namely, that though they are hermaphrodite, they 

 have small additional, or as I shall call them, complemental 

 males, one specimen itself hermaphrodite had no less than 

 seven, of these complemental males attached to it. Truly the 

 schemes and wonders of Nature are illimitable. But I am 

 running on as badly about my cirripedia as about Geology ; it 

 makes me groan to think that probably I shall never again 

 have the exquisite pleasure of making out some new district, 

 of evolving geological light out of some troubled dark region. 

 So I must make the best of my Cirripedia. . . . 



C. Darwin to J. D. Hooker. 



Down, October I2th, 1849. 



. . . By the way, one of the pleasantest parts of the British 

 Association was my journey down to Birmingham with 

 Mrs. Sabine, Mrs. Reeve, and the Colonel ; also Col. Sykes 

 and Porter. Mrs. Sabine and myself agreed wonderfully on 

 many points, and in none more sincerely than about you. 

 We spoke about your letters from the Erebus ; and she quite 

 agreed with me, that you and the author * of the description 

 of the cattle hunting in the Falklands, would have made 

 a capital book together ! A very nice woman she is, and so 

 is her sharp and sagacious mother. . . . Birmingham was 

 very flat compared to Oxford, though I had my wife with 

 me. We saw a good deal of the Lyells and Homers and 

 Robinsons (the President) ; but the place was dismal, and 



* Sir J. Hooker wrote the spirited the Southern Regions,' 1847, vol. ii. 

 description of cattle hunting in Sir p. 245. 

 J. Ross's 'Voyage of Discovery in 



