COLLEGE APPOINTMENT. 149 



foundations of the new grand stove are to be laid. It will be 

 06 feet high, 100 feet wide, and 340 feet long ! the largest in 

 England, and consequently in the world, unless the Winter 

 Palace have a larger, which I doubt. The contract for the 

 work has been taken by an Irishman. 



"I have got a new and extraordinary net-ioork Alga from 

 New Holland, still more elaborate in structure than the Claudea. 

 It is composed of jointed filaments resembling those of a 

 CallitJiamnion, woven together into a regular net with hexagonal 

 meshes. This net forms leaves, having a mid-rib and pinnated 

 riblets or veins running through it, andthe leaves are like oak- 

 leaves in form, so that the whole looks like the skeleton of an 

 oak-leaf. Its name is Thuretia quercifolia. There is a net- 

 work at both surfaces of the leaves, the rib-work forming the 

 central part. All is quite open like lace. Unfortunately the 

 French are before us in finding it, and we must adopt their 

 name ; but that is a trifle. My specimen was picked up by a 

 lady who accidentally landed for a few hours in a little harbour, 

 into which the ship put during a gale, and she describes the 

 shore as being covered with the most wonderful profusion of 

 plants and animals. She got all the pocket handkerchiefs of 

 the party and filled them with what came first to hand, and in 

 this hasty way picked up sixty different kinds of sponges, forty 

 of which are new species, and several Algae, among which was 

 the above described beauty. Her husband (a captain) is going- 

 out again, and promises to gather all he can meet with. Don't 

 I hope he may have a run in again in a squall !" 



His vacation tour is sketched as follows, in a letter to his 

 friend, the late Mr. W. Thompson, 1 of Belfast : — 



Limerick, September ID, 1844. 

 I have just returned from England, having spent six weeks 

 at Kew and nearly two at Torquay. I have since been in Cork 

 and Cahir, and go to Kilkee from this, before settling down to 

 work quietly for the winter, when I shall not be sorry to have 

 done with rambling for a season. I have added to the Herbarium 

 of T.C.D. between 3000 and 4000 species, contributed by Sir 

 William Hooker from his duplicates. 



I was delighted to find Mrs. Griffiths looking remarkably 



1 Author of the " Natural History of Ireland." 



