1824-33 'MEMOIR ON THE PEARLY NAUTILUS' 59 



many accounts, and I trust you will reap the 

 benefit of it ultimately. . . . 



1 I look forward with great and anxious plea- 

 sure to the time when we may expect you to visit 

 Lancaster, my dear son, which I fear may not 

 be till next summer — a long period for one at 

 my time of life. . . .' 



Owen was occupied during the end of 1831 

 and beginning of 1832 with the work which first 

 attracted the attention of scientific men towards 

 him, namely the ' Memoir on the Pearly Nautilus, 

 1832,' the description of which seemed to have 

 given his mind a bent in a definite direction. 



On the appearance of this memoir it was 

 translated into French by Milne Edwards, and 

 into German by Oken. In it the author enters, 

 in a way characteristic of subsequent memoirs, into 

 collateral questions on which the new facts threw 

 light. He modifies the Cuvierian classification 

 of Cephalopoda, based on characters of the shell, 

 and proposes, on anatomical grounds, the orders 

 Dibranchiata and Tetrabranchiata, which have 

 been accepted. 



He had meanwhile moved from Cook's Court 

 to Symond's Inn, as we find from an old inventory 

 of his furniture, some of which was sold in the 

 move. In a letter to Miss Clift, dated from the 

 College of Surgeons, April 24, 1832, he is anxious 

 that she should lend him her assistance in ' en- 

 deavouring to abridge the term that opposes 



