44 TRANSACTIONS LIVERPOOL BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



On the return of the Expedition, Wyville Thomson was 

 appointed Director of the " Challenger Expedition Commis- 

 sion " for the purpose of seeing to the distribution and 

 investigation of the vast collections, and the publication of the 

 results. In selecting specialists to prepare the reports, Thomson 

 and his successor Murray very wisely chose the best men 

 available, irrespective of nationality. Consequently, the 

 fifty quarto volumes of reports contain some of the best work 

 of the most distinguished naturalists of all countries. It was 

 not, however, until twenty years after the expedition that the 

 last of these volumes was issued, and the last of the collections 

 was safely deposited in the British Museum. 



It is unfortunate that the man of science has so frequently 

 to make a choice between the necessary work of administration 

 and original research. Let us trust that he does not invariably 

 select the work for which he is least fitted. Sir Wyville 

 Thomson was given little time for either. In the few years 

 of work that remained before his health gave way, he was so 

 occupied with his many and varied duties as Director of the 

 Commission and Editor of the Reports, that there was little 

 time for the original work he had planned to do in connection 

 with the collections of Stalked Crinoids and of Hexactinellid 

 Sponges — the two groups that he had reserved for his own 

 investigation, and upon which he was an acknowledged 

 authority. 



He was knighted in 1876, and was awarded one of the 

 gold medals by the Royal Society. In 1877, he delivered the 

 Rede Lecture at Cambridge, and in the following year presided 

 over one of the sections of the British Association at Dublin. 

 It was during these years, after the return of the Expedition, 

 that I was privileged to know him, first as a senior student and 

 young Assistant and t then as Naturalist on the "Challenger" 

 Commission, when I had priceless opportunities of becoming 

 acquainted with the wonderful collections, and with the 



