198 



Di\ Carpenter's Preliminary Report 



[Dec. 17, 



dredging for a month or six weeks of the present summer, commencing early in 

 August. 



Though we desire that this inquiry should be extended both in geographical 

 range and in depth as far as is proposed in Prof. Wyville Thomson's letter, we 

 think it preferable to limit ourselves on the present occasion to a request which 

 will not, we believe, involve the extra expense of sending out a coaling- vessel. 

 We should propose to make Kirkwall or Lerwick our port of departure, to ex- 

 plore the sea-bottom between the Shetland and the Faroe Islands, dredging 

 around the shores and in the fiords of the latter (which have not yet, we be- 

 lieve, been scientifically examined), and then to proceed as far north-west into the 

 deep water between the Faroe Islands and Iceland as may be found practicable. 



It would be desirable that the vessel provided for such a service should be 

 one capable of making way under canvas, as well as by steam-power ; but as our 

 operations must necessarily be slow, speed would not be required. Considerable 

 labour would be spared to the crew if the vessel be provided with a " donkey- 

 engine " that could be used for pulling up the dredge. 



If the Council of the Royal Society should deem it expedient to prefer this 

 request to the Admiralty, I trust that they may further be willing to place at 

 the disposal of Prof. Wyville Thomson and myself, either from the Donation 

 Fund or the Government-Grant Fund, a sum of £100 for the expenses we must 

 incur in providing an ample supply of spirit and of jars for the preservation of 

 specimens, with other scientific appliances. We would undertake that the 

 choicest of such specimens should be deposited in the British Museum. 



I shall be obliged by your bringing this subject before the Council of the 

 Royal Society, and remain, 



Dear General Sabine, yours faithfully, 

 The President of the Royal Society. William B. Carpenter. 



From Prof. Wyville Thomson, Belfast, to Dr. Carpenter, V.P.R.S. 



May 30, 1868. 



My dear Carpenter, — When I last saw you, I suggested how very im- 

 portant it would be to the advancement of science to determine with accuracy 

 the conditions and distribution of Animal Life at great depths in the ocean ; I 

 now resume the facts and considerations which lead me to believe that researches 

 in this direction promise valuable results. 



All recent observations tend to negative Edward Forbes's opinion that a 

 zero of animal life was to be reached at a depth of a few hundred fathoms. Two 

 years ago, M. Sars, Swedish Government Inspector of Fisheries, had an oppor- 

 tunity in his official capacity of dredging off the LofToden Islands at a depth of 

 800 fathoms. I visited Norway shortly after his return, and had an opportunity 

 of studying with his father, Prof. Sars, some of his results. Animal forms were 

 abundant; many of them were new to science; and among them was one of 

 surpassing interest, the small Crinoid of which you have a specimen, and which 

 we at once recognized as a degraded type of the Apiocrinidce, an order hitherto 

 regarded as extinct, which attained its maximum in the Bear-encrinites of the 

 Jurassic Period, and whose latest representative hitherto known was the Bour- 

 yuetticrinus of the Chalk. Some years previously, M. Absjornsen, dredging in 

 200 fathoms in the Hardangerijord, procured several examples of a Starfish 

 (Brisinya) which seems to find its nearest ally in the fossil genus Protaster. 

 These observations place it beyond a doubt that animal life is abundant in the 



