Memoir of the Rev. John Stevens Henslow, M.A., F.L.S., F.G.S., F.C.P.S. : late rector of Hitcham, and Professor of Botany in the University of Cambridge / by Leonard Jenyns.

  • Jenyns, Leonard, 1800-1893.
Date:
1862
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Memoir of the Rev. John Stevens Henslow, M.A., F.L.S., F.G.S., F.C.P.S. : late rector of Hitcham, and Professor of Botany in the University of Cambridge / by Leonard Jenyns. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    worth noticing, from its being clue to the circumstance of a most useful net which Henslow invented about the year 1815 for straining the minutest shells from the mud of ditches, in which many of them are found deeply embedded. Conchologists had previously made use of iron spoons or ladles with holes in them, which did the required work very imperfectly. The net here spoken of is constructed of the finest wire gauze bound round an iron frame, one or two inches deep inside, with a second netting of coarser wire outside to defend it from injury : a wooden handle may be affixed of any length, or a common walking-stick made to screw into it. It serves the purpose for which it is intended admirably; and it is only one of the many instances in which through life Henslow displayed his ingenuity in contriving whatever he wanted from time to time to assist him in carrying out his designs. He was always ready with some mechanical contrivance to meet diffi- culties and to further his operations. I am unwilling to speak of myself; but it was entirely by the help of this net, and the co-operation of its inventor, that many years after, when I had discovered one or two other species of these little bi- valves, I was enabled to publish a “ Monograph on the British Species of Cyclas and Pisidium,” a contri- bution to British conchology which Henslow would have himself previously brought out, but for the cir- cumstance of his attention being drawn to more im- portant objects of research. I feel, indeed, here called upon to state how much I owe to his friendship. I had, long previously to making his acquaintance, devoted myself to the study of natural history, but he