XXXV11 



After graduation he spent some time in the University of Wurzburg, 

 forking nnder Professor Semper ; and in 1877 lie was appointed 

 Assistant Master at Eton College, in special charge of the teaching in 

 biology, a post which he held up to the time of his death, on October 

 22, 1891. 



Herbert Carpenter was a naturalist from the first, and took part 

 in some of the most important biological movements of recent times. 

 He accompanied the earlier dredging expeditions which preceded and 

 rendered possible the famous cruise of H.M.S. " Challenger;" he was 

 a prominent member, and one of the earliest, of the new school of 

 biology at Cambridge ; and his appointment on the staff of one of 

 the greatest of public schools was hailed as a significant recognition 

 of the educational value of biological science, and of the importance 

 of making adequate provision for it in schools. 



When only sixteen years of age he accompanied his father on the 

 deep-sea exploring expedition of H.M.S. "Lightning." In the fol- 

 lowing years he took part in the dredging cruises of the " Porcupine," 

 and in 1875 he was one of the scientific staff on board H.M.S. 

 "Valorous," which -accompanied Sir George Nares' Arctic Expedition 

 as far as Disco Island, for the purpose of sounding and dredging in 

 Davis Strait and in the North Atlantic. 



On these expeditions he was mainly occupied in chemical and 

 physical observations, and it was not until he went to Wurzburg, in 

 1875, that he commenced the special study of the group of animals, 

 the Echinodermata, to which the remainder of his life was so success- 

 fully devoted. The choice of this group was almost an accidental 

 one, and was determined in the first instance by the opportunity his 

 residence at Wurzburg gave him of examining Professor Semper's 

 specimens, and so of determining the real extent and cause of the dis- 

 crepancies between the results obtained by his father and by Professor 

 Semper, with regard to certain points in the anatomy of the recent 

 Crinoids. 



Professor Semper was much interested in Carpenter's work, and 

 on the completion of his first paper, placed in his hands the import- 

 ant collection of Actinometrse he had himself obtained from the 

 Philippine Islands. The examination of this material occupied 

 Carpenter for nearly two years, and led to the publication of an 

 elaborate and very important monograph on the genus, in the Trans- 

 actions of the Linnean Society, which established his reputation as 

 an authority on the group. On the return of the "Challenger" 

 Expedition, and the distribution of the collections, the free-swimming 

 Crinoids were at once entrusted to Carpenter, and on the death of 

 Sir Wyville Thomson, in 1882, the stalked Crinoids were handed to 

 him as well. Carpenter's reports on these two groups, published in 

 1884 and 1888 respectively, are of a most elaborate and complete 



/ 



