1855-1857.] ASSOCIATION REPORT. 



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original sources of information (so far as known to him), and 

 then embodied them in a table arranged geographically and 

 zoologically. He could not refrain from some few character- 

 istic indications of feeling; e.g., he alludes to the peculiar 

 institution ' of the stripe-flagged United States," and to " the 

 Mexican War, carried on by the United States against their 

 sister republic, ending in the extension of slavery, [which] was 

 indirectly the means of adding to our knowledge of the Cali- 

 fornian and Mexican faunas." He rises into eloquence when, 

 in a long passage, he bids the student follow the course of the 

 fauna through various seas, finding at each step something in 

 common with the last. At the Galapagos, within six hundred 

 miles of the shores of the great bay of Central America, " his 

 eye rests with pleasure on a few well-known Cones and other 

 forms which have crossed the fathomless depths, and come 

 to claim kindred with their molluscan brotherhood of the New 

 World. But here they stop. They could traverse half a 

 world of waters. The human spirit, that gives them under- 

 standing and a voice, beholds them on the very threshold of 

 the promised continent, in whose bays and harbours, pro- 

 tected by the chain of the everlasting mountains, they shall 

 find the goal of their long pilgrimage. But the Word of the 

 unknown Power has gone forth, and the last narrow channel 

 they attempt to cross in vain" (p. 346). 



He ends thus : "The object of this Report has been so 

 to condense and arrange the existing materials, that those who 

 consult it may know what has been done, and may have the 

 means of deciding on the value to be attached to different 

 sources of information. Thus they may begin where the writer 

 leaves off, and not spend precious time in working out afresh 

 what has been already ascertained. He has stated his opinions 

 with some freedom ; because it was thought that an expression 

 of the difficulties encountered in the prosecution of the subject, 

 and of their causes, might (1) put other students on their guard, 

 and (2) contribute somewhat towards their removal. . . . His 

 object has been, not himself to build, but to clear away some 

 of the encumbrances, lay part of the foundations, and collect 



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