384 PROFESSOR OWEN ch. xil 



grant with newly opening azaleas and whitethorn, 

 and I was tempted to the brink of the little lake 

 by the strange gambols and gyrations of the great 

 black-backed carp. At half-past four I returned 

 again to bed and slept till half-past nine, in com- 

 fortable instinctive unconsciousness that the whole 

 was a reality and no early morning dream ! ' 



This delight at living in the country was a life- 

 long pleasure to Owen ; he is always referring to it 

 in his letters, and in his later days, when his strength 

 was declining and sleep was uncertain, he caused 

 his bed to be raised to an unusual height, that he 

 might, ' as he lay in bed, look out at the Park, and 

 at the deer and the birds. ' 



Before leaving his rooms at the College of 

 Surgeons, and entering the new house, Owen 

 gave his course of Hunterian Lectures, which 

 in this year (1852) was on the ' Anatomy of In- 

 vertebrates.' In 1843 his Hunterian Lectures 

 had been on the same subject, but this course was 

 not a mere repetition of the former ; nor was this 

 volume merely a reprint of the other, for, as he 

 states in the preface to the volume of his later 

 Lectures, ' the difference between them is in some 

 measure indicative of the progress of the anatomy 

 and physiology of the invertebrate animals during 

 the ten years which intervened between my first 

 and last course of lectures on that subject.' 



In this year his ' Physiological Catalogue 

 of the Hunterian Collections ' reached its second 



