of the sea-squirts, which in adult
life are to be found attached to rocks like weeds, drift about in the
surface waters until their time comes for settling down in life. Many
other Ascidians pass their whole life as pelagic creatures. A few
molluscs, many kinds of worms, echinoderms, and their allies, crab and
lobster-like creatures in innumerable different stages of development,
are to be found there, while unnumbered polyps and jelly-fish are
always present. It would be difficult to imagine a better training for
the naturalist than to spend years, as Huxley did, working at this
varied assortment of living creatures. Huxley declared that the
difficulties of examining such flimsy creatures had been exaggerated.

"At least, with a good light and a good microscope, with the ship
tolerably steady, I never failed in procuring all the information
I required. The great matter is to obtain a good successive
supply of specimens, as the more delicate oceanic species are
usually unfit for examination within a few hours after they are
taken."

Day after day, as the _Rattlesnake_ crept from island to island,
Huxley examined the animals brought up by his tow-net. He made endless
dissections, and gradually accumulated a large portfolio of drawings.
Much of the time he passed at Sydney was spent in libraries and
museums, comparing his own observations with the recorded observations
of earlier workers, and receiving from the combination of his own work
and the work of others new ideas for his future investigations. It was
all entirely a labour of love; it lay outside the professional duties
by which he made his living, and for a long time it seemed as if he
was not even to gain reputation by the discoveries he knew himself to
be making. He writes in his autobiography:

"During the four years of our absence, I sent home communication
after communication to the 'Linnaean' Society, with the same
result as that obtained by Noah when he sent the raven out of his
ark. Tired at last of hearing nothing about them, I determined to
do or die, and in 1849 I drew up a more elaborate paper and
forwarded it to the Royal Society. This was my dove, if I had
only known it; but owing to the movements of the ship I heard
nothing of that either until my return to England in the latter
end of the year 1850, when I found that it was printed and
published, and that a huge pac