1851 LETTER TO W. MACLEAY, SYDNEY 133 



afraid, nine or ten months old, but here in England the 

 fighting and scratching to keep your place in the crowd 

 exclude almost all other thoughts. When I last wrote I 

 was but at the edge of the crush at the pit -door of 

 this great fools' theatre now I have worked my way into 

 it and through it, and am, I hope, not far from the 

 check-takers. I have learnt a good deal in my passage. 



[Follows an account of his efforts to get his papers 

 published substantially a repetition of what has 

 already been given.] 



Rumours there are scattered abroad of a favourable 

 cast, and I am told on all hands that something will 

 certainly be done. I only asked for 300, something 

 less than the cost of a parliamentary blue-book which 

 nobody ever hears of. They take care to obliterate any 

 spark of gratitude that might perchance arise for what 

 they do, by keeping one so long in suspense that the 

 result becomes almost a matter of indifference. Had I 

 known they would keep me so long, I would have 

 published my work as a series of papers in the Philo- 

 sophical Transactions. 



In the meanwhile I have not been idle, as I hope to 

 show you by the various papers enclosed with this. You 

 will recollect that on the Salpae. No one here knew 

 anything about them, and I thought that all my results 

 were absolutely new until, me miserum! I found them 

 in a little paper of Krohn's in the Annales des Sciences for 

 1846, without any figures to draw anybody's attention. 



The memoir on the Medusae (which I sent to you) has, 

 I hear, just escaped a high honour to wit, the Royal 

 MedaL The award has been made to Newport for his 

 paper on " Impregnation." I had no idea that anything 

 I had done was likely to have the slightest claim to such 

 distinction, but I was informed yesterday by one of the 

 Council that the balance hung pretty evenly, and was 



