1848-49 HUGH CUMING'S COLLECTION OF SHELLS 313 



to indispose many minds towards a dispassionate 

 appreciation of them.' 



At this time Owen's mind was much oc- 

 cupied with another consideration. The re- 

 markable collection of shells formed by Hugh 

 Cuming had been offered for sale to the British 

 Museum. The importance of this series was so 

 great in Owen's eyes that he wrote a strong 

 appeal in January 1848, filling thirteen quarto 

 pages, to Dean Buckland (a Trustee of the Bri- 

 tish Museum), urging upon him the necessity of 

 the purchase. From this appeal we give a few 

 extracts : — 



' I may briefly state that this collection, as 

 now offered to the British Museum, contains 

 upwards of 19,000 species and varieties of shells, 

 represented by about 60,000 specimens ; and that 

 not only is every specimen entire, but choice and 

 perfect of its kind, as respects form, texture, 

 colour, and other characters that give it value in 

 the eyes of the shell-collector. 



' As I can affirm from my personal knowledge, 

 and from authentic sources of information, that no 

 public collection in Europe possesses one-half the 

 number of species of shells that are now in the 

 Cumingian Collection . . . you may judge of the 

 vast proportion of rarities and unique specimens 

 possessed by Mr. Cuming. It is this which has 

 given him for some years past the command, so 

 to speak, of all the conchological cabinets in 



