A HISTORY OF DEVONSHIRE 



be understood that an important institution such as ' The Marine Biological Association of the 

 United Kingdom ' fixed its headquarters at Plymouth not by any random choice, but for the solid 

 reason that no other locality was more promising for its intended researches. Scientific literature 

 had already spoken with no uncertain sound in this behalf. Especially in this branch of it the men 

 who must be regarded as the chief pioneers of British carcinology either had their residence in 

 Devonshire or resorted to it eagerly for material. Foremost must be mentioned Colonel George 

 Montagu (17 51-18 15), who was born at Lackham in Wiltshire, but settled late in life at Knowle 

 House, near Kingsbridge, from which point of vantage he made the neighbourhood of Salcombe 

 notable by his discoveries among marine invertebrates. So identified did he become with the region 

 that Dr. Edward Moore, writing in 1838 on the Malacostracous Crustacea of South Devon, says: 

 ' I am unwilling that in the county of Montagu and Leach the subject should appear to be altogether 

 neglected, possessing, as it does, such remarkable advantages for the pursuit.' ^ The William Elford 

 Leach (i 790-1 836) to whom Moore is referring was born at Plymouth, and has therefore an 

 indigenous claim to rank among the worthies of Devon. His precocious genius inspired him at the 

 age of twenty-three to undertake the task of reforming classification in the three extensive groups of 

 crustaceans, myriapods, and arachnids. His first efforts at arranging this assemblage were contained 

 in an article to which he gave the barbarous title ' Crustaceology.' We speak of efforts in the 

 plural, because the article has an appendix containing additions and alterations. It was published in 

 the seventh volume of Brewster's Edinburgh Encyclopaedia, which appeared in 1813. Similar 

 treatises from his pen were soon afterwards published in The Transactions of the Linnean Society and 

 in the fifth edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. The merit and capacity of the young naturalist 

 were speedily recognized by his election into the Royal Society in 181 7, and by his employment in 

 the following year to write on his special subject for the Dictionnaire des Sciences Naturelles, at an 

 epoch when French zoologists might well have deemed themselves self-sufficing for such a task. To 

 the success of Leach's studies contribution was gladly made by the veteran Montagu, by Cranch, 

 and by Prideaux. The last of these, Mr. Charles Prideaux of Hatch Arundel, near Kingsbridge, is 

 mentioned by Moore as chief benefactor in providing the museum of the Plymouth Institution with 

 a very excellent collection of British Malacostraca. In the second half of the nineteenth century 

 public attention was directed scarcely less prominently than in the first half to Devonian carcinology. 

 In this case the leading spirit was Charles Spence Bate (1819-89), a Cornishman by birth, but from 

 1 85 1 onwards resident at Plymouth. He had abilities and ambition, and the confidence in himself 

 which those qualities are apt to generate. His numerous and extensive writings created in Great Britain 

 a livelier interest in the subject of Crustacea than it could otherwise at the time have enjoyed. In regard 

 to some groups he had the merit and excuse of being to some extent a pioneer, a road-maker. But 

 through too frequent miscalculation of his own powers he built his roads at many points so faultily 

 as to earn anything but blessings from those who used them. The names of other zoologists who 

 have concerned themselves with the crustacea of Devon are in this field less conspicuous than 

 Spence Bate's, because for the most part they have extended their survey to many other branches of 

 marine zoology. This was the case with Philip Henry Gosse (1810—88), long resident at 

 St. Mary Church and well known for his Rambles on the Devonshire Coast and many other scientific 

 works both popular and technical. It was the case also with Edward Parfitt (1820-93), ^ °^°^* 

 industrious naturalist, for many years curator of the Devon and Exeter Institution. In the same 

 category may be placed many who on occasional visits or during more or less protracted periods of 

 residence have worked on the fauna of Devon, such as Charles Kingsley (1819-75), the 

 Rev. Dr. Norman, F.R.S., Walter Garstang, F.Z.S., and others whose names will be cited in the 

 course of this chapter. The united efforts of so many eager and accomplished naturalists have 

 concentrated upon this county a mass of information which can only here be dealt with by severe 

 compression. In the lists which follow it should be understood that the generic and specific names 

 beginning a line are those considered by the present writer to be valid for the species in question.^ 

 They are followed by the name of the author who established the species, such author's name being 

 in parenthesis when the species no loriger stands in the genus to which he at first assigned it. The 

 synonymy of rejected names is added for the convenience of students who may wish to seek 

 further information in such works as Bell's History of British Stalk-eyed Crustacea, the Histeire 

 Naturelle des Crustacis by H. Milne-Edwards, or elsewhere. Verification of the occurrence of species 

 in Devonshire will be found largely in the journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United 

 Kingdom (new series), vol. vii. No. 2, pp. 234-258, 1904 ; in Parfitt's Catalogues contributed to the 

 Devonshire Association ; and in various other works to which general or special references will be 

 given later on. The division of the class Crustacea here adopted is into four sub-classes — 

 Malacostraca, Leptostraca, Entomostraca, Thyrostraca. 



' CharksviortVs Mag. Nat. Hist, (new ser.), iii, 284 (1839). 



' See Hist, of Crustacea (Inter. Scientific Ser.), vol. Ixxiv (1893) for the general system of nomenclature 

 here adopted. 



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