lens volens a fixture. I am
particularly glad you have been at the Coal; I have often since you went
gone on maundering on the subject, and I shall never rest easy in Down
churchyard without the problem be solved by some one before I die.
Talking of dying makes me tell you that my confounded stomach is much
the same; indeed, of late has been rather worse, but for the last year,
I think, I have been able to do more work. I have done nothing besides
the barnacles, except, indeed, a little theoretical paper on erratic
boulders (27/2. "On the Transportal of Erratic Boulders from a Lower to
a Higher Level" ("Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc." Volume IV., pages 315-23.
1848). In this paper Darwin favours the view that the transport of
boulders was effected by coast-ice. An earlier paper entitled "Notes on
the Effects produced by the ancient Glaciers of Caernarvonshire, and on
the Boulders transported by floating Ice" ("Phil. Mag." 1842, page 352)
is spoken of by Sir Archibald Geikie as standing "almost at the top of
the long list of English contributions to the history of the Ice
Age" ("Charles Darwin," "Nature" Series, page 23).), and Scientific
Geological Instructions for the Admiralty Volume (27/3. "A manual of
Scientific Enquiry, prepared for the use of Her Majesty's Navy, and
adapted for Travellers in General." Edited by Sir John F.W. Herschel,
Bart. Section VI.--Geology--by Charles Darwin. London, 1849. See "Life
and Letters," pages 328-9.), which cost me some trouble. This work,
which is edited by Sir J. Herschel, is a very good job, inasmuch as
the captains of men-of-war will now see that the Admiralty cares for
science, and so will favour naturalists on board. As for a man who is
not scientific by nature, I do not believe instructions will do him any
good; and if he be scientific and good for anything the instructions
will be superfluous. I do not know who does the Botany; Owen does the
Zoology, and I have sent him an account of my new simple microscope,
which I consider perfect, even better than yours by Chevalier. N.B. I
have got a 1/8 inch object-glass, and it is grand. I have been getting
on well with my beloved Cirripedia, and get more skilful in dissection.
I have worked out the nervous system pretty well in several genera,
and made out their ears and nostrils (27/4. For the olfactory sacs see
Darwin's "Monograph of the Cirripedia," 1851, page 52.), which were
quite unknown. I have lately got a bisexual cirripede, the mal