1831-1836.] 



SHELLS. 



5 



he took an influential part ; various courses of lectures were 

 delivered by eminent men, which his family and pupils regularly 

 attended, and a very valuable museum was formed, peculiarly 

 rich in fossils and shells. The first curator was Mr. Miller, a 

 scientific naturalist, chiefly known by his work on the Crinoidea; 

 he was succeeded in 1831 by Mr. S. Stutchbury, a very zealous 

 and able zoologist. Among the lecturers was Mr. Samuel 

 Worsley, who devoted the proceeds of his course on geology 

 (nearly ^100) to the benefit of the Institution. He and his 

 brothers had been pupils of Dr. Carpenter's, and it was at 

 school that an accident led to his gradual loss of sight. He 

 bravely resolved to make the most of his opportunities, and 

 before he became blind had studied geology at Edinburgh ; 

 subsequently he gave special attention to fossils and shells, 

 which he could distinguish by the touch. The families at the 

 Fort, where he resided, and at Great George Street were very 

 intimate, and it was a great enjoyment to Philip to visit there, 

 and afterwards at Arno's Vale,* to study conchology, and to 

 clean the fossils which they had gone together to collect f from 

 the quarrymen of Dundry and Keynsham. In January, 1832, 

 Philip wrote for his sister Mary, I then visiting at the Fort, a 

 report of the committee (probably himself alone !) for the 

 arrangement of the cabinet, signed " P. P. Carpenter, chair- 

 boy," in which he mentions " that the arduous task of setting 



* The house at the Fort is now the Children's Hospital, and that at 

 Arno's Vale was taken down when the grounds were converted into the 

 Bristol cemetery. 



f Part of this valuable collection was subsequently bought by the School 

 of Mines, Jermyn Street, and part by the Natural History Society of 

 Philadelphia. 



X His sister at this time heard him his Greek lessons, and in a letter to 

 their aunt, Mrs. Fisher (authoress of "The Legend of the Puritans," and 

 other poems), she wrote, November 26, 1832: "Philip is such a merry- 

 hearted fellow, and he takes so much pleasure in arranging his shells. To be 

 sure, this taste of his does show itself rather mal-a-propos sometimes. He per- 

 sists in translating x LT(av (tunic) chiton (the same word), an ugly little shell 

 like a woodlouse [the chitons afterwards became Philip's chief study : 

 see the concluding chapter] ; and when he read in Homer of Achilles 

 weeping on the sea-shore, he said, ' What a pity it is that Achilles was 

 not fond of conchology : he would have had such a nice opportunity of 

 gathering shells while he was in dudgeon with Agamemnon ! ' n 



