Miscellaneous. 169 



" My notes had only to do with the use of the dredge, and what I 

 meant to convey was ' Dr. Wallich records the presence of life at 

 great depths ; but the animals thus recorded belong to the Protozoa, 

 with the exception of the Ophiocoma. Now, this was taken, not by 

 the dredge, but by the accident of its clinging to the sounding-line ; 

 for the purpose of demonstrating the occurrence of Echinoderm life 

 at such depths, it was as valuable a fact as if a hundred starfishes 

 had been taken by a dredge. But, after all, it is not with a 

 sounding-line, but with a dredge, that we must look for these forms 

 of life ; and as by the use of this machine I have found some addi- 

 tional forms, I hasten to record them,' &c. Again expressing my 

 regret that I so wrote the sentence you extract that it should appear 

 even for a moment to make little of the persevering labours of my 

 accomplished friend, and trusting you will publish at least the 

 substance of this letter in your early number of ' Scientific Opinion,' 



" I remain, ifcc. 



" Ed. Pekceval Wright, M.D." 

 " Museum, Trinitv College, Dublin. 

 Dec. 26." 



" The Dredge and the Sounding-Machine at Great Depths. 



" Sir, — The frank and manly explanation offered by my friend Dr. 

 E. Perceval Wright, in his letter published in ' Scientific Opinion ' of 

 the 80th ult., regarding the sense in which he used the term ' acci- 

 dental,' when referring to the capture of the Ophiocoma} from a depth 

 of 1260 fathoms in the North Atlantic, deserves my warmest acknow- 

 ledgments ; and I can only say that the manner in which he has 

 withdrawn the sting from his words, the moment it was brought to 

 his notice, proves him to be made of the right metal. 



" I have accordingly to thank him for his letter, and also to ex- 

 press my obligation to you for showing, in the brief note which you 

 appended to the transcript of Dr. Wright's paper on 'Deep-Sea 

 Dredging,' that I was by no means solitary in the interpretation I 

 put upon the second paragraph of his communication. In order, 

 however, to remove any misconception that may exist as to the cir- 

 cumstances under which I failed to use the dredge in preference to 

 the sounding-machine, and also to prove that the discovery of animal 

 life at the greatest depths in the ocean was fully believed in by me 

 even before the capture of the Ophiocoma? set the question at rest for 

 ever, I beg the attention of your readers to the subjoined extract of 

 a letter addressed by me to Sir Leopold M'Clintock, when our ex- 

 pedition reached its extreme outward destination, at Sydney, in 

 Nova Scotia, premising that I cannot doubt Sir Leopold would have 

 cheerfully afforded me the opportunities I so earnestly solicited, had 

 the instructions received from the Admiralty and the exigencies of 

 an exceptionally tempestuous season permitted him to do so. My 

 letter was dated Sept. 7th, 1860. In it, after drawing attention to 

 the very meagre results attained during the outward voyage, and 

 the comparatively small number of instances in which apparatus for 



Ann. & Mag. N. Hist. Ser. 4. Vol, in. 12 



