AFTER seven weeks, the rocks of Scilly appeared to have seen enough of me. A residence so protracted astonished and fatigued them. They knew all my varying moods, and one unvarying, not picturesque, costume. Familiar with the ring of my hammer, as it chiselled with savage pertinacity at their granite ribs, they were not less familiar with the compass of my voice, and the extent of my operatic reminiscences, as, seduced by their solitudes, to the orchestral inspiration of their waves, I loosened all the power of my lungs in lyrical fervour. For seven weeks had our intimacy lasted, and now there arose the conviction that the time for separation had arrived. Nothing new could possibly be learnt about me. Their curiosity was satisfied, if not satiated; and my presence began to carry a certain monotony with it. Even the two or three meagre dogs, which sniffed about the pier, began to eye me with an air of supercilious weariness; and I forbear to investigate the sentiments of the Scillians, lest they should too painfully resemble the indifference of the dogs. Decidedly it was time to pack up. In spite, therefore, of the inexhaustible obligingness of my friend, Mr J. G. Moyle, the admirable surgeon of whom Scilly is justly proud-in spite of his efforts to make my residence every way agreeable, I took the hint: the Granite Beauties turned a cold boulder on me, and I resolved to bore them no longer. My animals were scattered to the four winds (figuratively, of course-one of the four being the railway to London, which transported a coffee-tin of anemones to a tank-loving lady); my tent was struck, and, after hurrying through Penzance, Falmouth, and Plymouth, it was once more pitched in the pretty island of Jersey.

Nothing could be more charming than the welcome smiled by the rich meadow-lands and orchards here. After the bold picturesque solitudes

of Scilly, it seemed like once more entering civilised nature. Every inch of ground was cultivated. Cornfields and orchards resplendent with blossoms, sloped down to the very edge of the shore, and, by the prodigality of soil, defied the withering influence of sea-breezes. It was not amazing to me to learn afterwards that the land in the interior yields double the crop, per acre, which can be raised in most parts of England; and that, although the rent is £10 an acre, such rent can be paid by potatoes alone. Elsewhere it is difficult to get even grass to grow close on the shore, and trees have always a look of stunted oldmaidenish misery; but here the high tide almost washes the hedge which limits orchards that no right-minded boy could resist robbing. Jersey, indeed, is the very paradise of farmers. The Americans say that England looks like a large garden. What England is to America, that is Jersey to England. Even the high-roads have the aspect of drives through a gentleman's grounds rather than of noisy thoroughfares; and the byroads and lanes are perfect pictures of embowered quiet and green seclusion. There never was a more delightful place to ramble in. Every turn opens on some exquisite valley, or some wooded hill, through the cool shades and glinting lights of which the summer wanderer is tempted to stray, or to recline in the long grass, and languorously listen to the multitudinous music of the birds and insects above and around. Observe I say nothing of the sea, and the succession of bays on the coast; for what can be said at all commensurate with that subject? Even the poets, who not only contrive to say the finest things about nature, but also teach us how to feel the finest tremors of delight when brought face to face with her, have very imperfectly spoken of the sea. Homer is lauded for having called it "wine-faced." He probably meant

some ivy-green potation size wize faced" is the epither by whim Sipho eles characterises the ivy.* I any case his epithet is cely an epite and the sea is of all colours, as it is of all forms and moods. Donbas also may be raised respecting the "pix gling which scrying in a semmity thumbed passage, attributes to the sea The innerable lauziter of the waves of the sea one is apt to interpret as a pimple; an expeed a not only unbecoming the sea, bat unworthy of the ocasion Nepomne was not mocking the army of Pro metheus with s scholar's tanti nence. He was too grand and fest for such weakness. În moments of serenest summer-caim he may he said to smile; in moments of more leaping mirth be may be said to laugh; but to imagine him astorting his countenance by inmenable gizzles, would be at all times intcl erable, and at much a time pertantly indefensible.

On the sea, therefore, allow me to be seat. On the rest attractive of Jersey for the naturalist, ote wil suffice: there is no så 54 in England for marine zoology. siles all these Chats it had other charms in Y ETER crated the grid Extractwenty years ago I was at school bere, Changed as the ages of St Hellers necessarily is, the few spots Ri recognisable had a pentar fasting tion for me. The Royal Sumare seemed to have shrunk to a third of its di dimensions, but with what sILLZE sensations I first reentered h! The Theatre had by no means the marial and imposing aspect which it the wore, when it seemed the sentre of perfect biss Its yellow playaca no longer thrilled me, altho mory wandered back to those happy nights when enchanting onely and tearful tragedy were sobered in by the overtures to Tamil" "Semiramide" the only two vie the orchestra ever played and when ponderons Eght emellans in casemere tights, or powerful tragedians "tock the stage" with truly Real strides. Gone, for ever gise, are those bright credulous daya. Never

more shall I see The School for Saavia or Pizarro, performed is I Bow them then Lair Teade wi Lever more lure me with her oogmettish fan, nor Gora transport me with her draping ringleta. I can't believe in the vines malety and good feeling of Charles Sumace : Die think Ros the most impassioned and eloquent of beina i know that the Benth Idents are 28 mares as the aring, or the stage wine and property" frit of Charles Surface's been. Tuning with a retrospettive sith into the Marke-Fax, I feel the breath of former years riding anni There is the very corner where we used to "toss" the plems

"Harder, Jack!" meaning that the victim had strength to withstand even harder blows-a brutal mob following without sympathy- the procession moving slowly from the Town-Hall to the Prison;—this was the picture Justice frequently presented to the inhabitants of Jersey, and which now, thank God, will never be seen by them again, but will take its place among the brutalities of the past, a sign of the onward progress we have made.

Although St Heliers, "the capital of Jersey," was the spot consecrated by memory, I took up my abode at the entrance of the fishing-village of Gorey, just four miles from St Heliers; and as these papers are addressed to amateur naturalists, some of whom may hereafter visit Jersey, a word on the reason of my choice may not be superfluous. The attractions of the capital I do not deny, and if the visitor is in need of watering-place attractions, he will pitch his tent there; but if his primary desires be zoology and quiet, he will select Gorey, especially during summer, when tide-hunting is necessarily poor, and only by dredging and trawling can he hope to get a good stock of animals. Always go where there are fishermen, that you may have the benefit of their aid. They may bring you what you would never find. It is true there are two sources of difficulty in your way: the first is the almost impossibility of making them understand that you can set any value on things they are accustomed to fling away; the second is, that when you have so tutored them that they know what you want, they are strangely backward in their supplies. Money is of course the only cogent argument; yet even money moves them but slowly. They go out day after day, staying out all night, and return often without a shilling's worth of fish; yet although you offer to pay them for oyster-shells and weeds as for fish, they cannot easily be induced to throw this "refuse" of their nets into a bucket, instead of throwing it overboard again. They promise to do so, but you wait in vain. At Tenby, in spite of urgent entreaties and liberal promises, only one Loligo was brought me; at Scilly nothing;

at Gorey, in spite of my being on the best terms with fishermen whom I had employed, and with whom I had gone trawling, five weeks passed before a bucket of refuse was brought me. Two words pertinacity and liberality-sum up the whole art of gaining this desirable result; when gained, you will need no argument to prove the superiority of a fishingvillage.

Comfortably settled at Gorey, and my working-room set in order, I had only to await the spring-tide, once more to gather a variety of pets around me. Not that I was even then without serious occupation. Before leaving Scilly I had put up my Nudibranchs in spirits of wine, and these were now carefully to be dissected. Make no wry face at the word "dissection"-it indicates a very different process from the one you conceive; and, as it is one indispensable to the naturalist, I may as well dissipate the prejudice which hangs over it. If prejudices could be satisfactorily displaced by argument, one might ask how a man can pass a butcher's shop with equanimity, yet shudder at the idea of dissecting a rabbit or a dog; but I will admit all such incongruities as facts not assailable by argument, and simply direct the reader's attention to the important differences between dissecting animals of the larger kind, and dissecting our marine pets-it is as great as the difference between knitting a silken purse in a drawingroom, and making a ship's cable in a rope-walk. Almost all our dissections are performed under water, with needles, tweezers, and delicate scissors. There is no blood to suggest unpleasant ideas; there is nothing unsightly-to the philosophic eye the sight is full of interest-and if an unsightly aspect were present, has not a noble poetess truly said :

"Be, rather, bold, and bear
To look into the swarthiest face of things
For God's sake who has made them.
How is this,
That men of science, osteologists
And surgeons, boat some poets, in respect
For nature-count nought common or un-
clean,

Spend raptures upon perfect specimens
Of indurated veins, distorted joints,
Or beautiful new cases of curved spine;

Nay, has not the greatest of German poets, whose culture of the beautiful was so devout that it has been made a reproach, given us a practical example that not only may Comparative Anatomy reveal its marvels to the delighted eye of a poet, but also that the keen glance of the poet may be that of a great discoverer in anatomy? To Goethe, bones and ligaments were not less beautiful and full of interest than flowers and streams, because he saw in them parts of the mystic scaffolding of the temple of life. And laborious and delicate as the amateur may find the dissection of animals to be, he will find his labour well rewarded at the close.

When the spring-tide did arrive it was unfortunately a very poor one; and had Jersey been less wealthy, my hot labours on the rocks would have produced but a meagre result. As it was, I managed to secure an ample supply of Sea Hares, Eolids, Dorids, Solitary Ascidians, Clavellina, Hydractinice, Pycnogonida, Actions, Anemones, and Polypes. In the way of novelty there was only the Hydractinia (a pretty little white polype growing in clusters on the outside of a whelk shell, inside of which was a hermit-crab) and the Actinia parasitica, hitherto only known to me through pictures, but which I found transcending in beauty all power of painting This beautiful Anemone is extremely abundant here at low tide, but scarcely merits its name of parasitica, for I find it almost as frequently on stones and on the sides of the rocks as on the whelk shells; and in captivity it quits its shell, roaming about the pie-dish, and fixing itself to the side, or to seaweeds, like any other Anemone. The extreme sensitiveness of the Parasitica enhances its attractions; it is for ever expanding and retracting its tentacles, elongating, curving, or retracting its stem; some

VOL. LXXXII.-NO. DII.

times doubling its length, at other striction in the middle. times assuming an hour-glass conThe fila

ments which contain the "thread capsules" are poured forth in great abundance whenever the animal is disturbed. While on the subject of Jersey Anemones, it may be added that, besides the ordinary species, I dredged what is probably a variety of the Actinia ornata, described and beautifully figured by Dr Strethill Wright in the Edinburgh Philosophical Journal for July 1856, the body white, the exterior circle of tentacles orange, the two interior circles white striped with grey, the disc orange in the centre; very charming to behold.

Having stocked my jars and dishes, I was somewhat reluctant to broil in a noonday sun amid the rocks, with little hope of finding any animal not already familiar; and therefore contented myself with the less exciting and more remunerative labour of deep-water hunting. By this I got initiated into the art and mystery of trawling, having made friends with a fisherman, master of a Trawler of about twenty tons. Pleasant it is on a bright sunny morning, with a nice breeze from the shore, to recline on the deck of a fast-sailing vessel, and listen to the men retailing their experiences, or watch them heave out and haul in the net.Away we glide towards the coast of France, Jersey melting in the distance :—

"The sands untumbled, the blue waves untost,

And all is stillness, save the seabird's cry

And dolphin's leap."

The net is at the bottom, collecting in its gaping mouth the treasures we are duly awaiting; meanwhile, in a sort of dreamy content, we stretch ourselves in the sun till the word is given to haul in, and then anxiety dissipates the luxurious calm. The trawl is a huge net of somewhat conical shape, from twenty to thirty feet wide, from thirty to forty deep. Along the edge of the wide opening is a stout wooden beam, to the ends of which are fastened the trawl heads, namely, thick flat semicircular bands

P

of iron, which serve to keep at a distance of three feet from the beam that portion of the net meant to touch the bottom. In the net there are various pockets. When the trawl is thrown overboard, the weight of the iron carries it to the bottom, the buoyancy of the wooden beam, assisted by the perpendicular support of the iron bands, keeping the upper edge of the net steadily floating three feet above the ground. The rope sweeping along the bottom disturbs the fish; up they dart in foolish distracted haste, and come in contact with the net overarching them; this flurries them, and they dart sideways to escape; in doing which they unsuspectingly swim into the not if they go one way, into the pockets if they go the other. The thus scraping the bottom, gathers, ecurse, a quantity of shells and weeds as well as fish; this is known to naturalists as "trawl refuse," and is always worth careful overhauling. The contents are all emptied apon the deck, and while Jack is grosting over the turbot, brill, soles, ste and gurnard, or grimly notic

the niter absence of those desirsõie Edividuals, you squat down and the refuse, and begin a long dease Lavestigation thereof. The ne sorce merè plunging its way to the vessel glides through music, and you are abager inspection of shell is probable that this peering, accompanied of the vessel, will use and headache, wch hitherto you I will not pretend but there is no e but the brave deThe pain is persists. You at the close of the and certainly you, Jack is treasures; only know

ing, as marks, characteristics by no means obvious. For example, when you read the sentence "shell flexible," among the curt indications by which an animal is to be identified, how are you to suspect that the animal in question has no shell visible at all, until you have dissected it, and found the thin calcareous plate underneath the back, covering the liver? That one sentence "shell flexible" prevented my identifying a Pleurobranchus for at least an hour. Nor have I to this day been able to identify the species of a compound Ascidian (which I only know to be an Ascidian from embryological indications), probably known to naturalists, perhaps yet undescribed. It is of a bright orange colour. From a transparent gelatinous basis minute cylindrical tubes rise, each about the twentieth of an inch in height, standing in circular groups. The orifice of each tube has four delicate processes radiating inwards, like the spokes of a wheel, or like the processes in the siphon of a cockle. This orifice is extensile and retractile, but does not open and shut like that of an Ascidian; and, moreover, the orifice is single. The heart, or pulsating sac, lies at the bottom of the visceral cavity. Imbedded in the clear gelatinous base are several branching vessels giving off pearshaped processes. These vessels connect the visceral cavities of the whole colony, and the globules of food are seen oscillating to and from the cavities into the pear-shaped processes. I was completely puzzled what to consider this animal, until I saw a tadpole embryo escape from it, and swim away, followed by several others; and then I knew an Ascidian of some kind was before me. A tadpole? Well, that is a figure of speech. The embryo of the Ascidian is more like a tadpole than anything else; and totally unlike its parent, not only in possessing a good long tail, but in being able to swim vigorously through the water in which the parent is immovable. In the interior of the round body which surmounts this tail, a mass of yellowish granules (the vitellus) is observed, which extends some way down the axis of the tail. The transparent membrane surround