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5

[[strikethrough]]accidents[[/strikethrough]] vicissitudes as dust, shock, rough handling and museum pests might bring.

When the naturalists of the Exploring Expedition returned, so great was the chagrin and disappointment felt by Couthony at the ruin of years of assiduous labor by the destruction of the means of identification above described, that he [[strikethrough]]gave up all the opportunity[[/strikethrough]] renounced his intention of working up the material he had collected. His beautiful drawings and such of his notes as he could connect with the specimens were placed in the hands of Dr. A. A. Gould of Boston, and embodied by him in the magnificent report on the shells of the Exploring expedition which was published to the extent of one hundred copies by the U.S. government.*


* On Dr Gould's own account an edition of fifty additional copies was struck off, most of which were uncolored.


I have been thus particular because the series of types of the Exploring Expedition formed the most valuable part of the Mollusk collection for many years, and are still among its most cherished specimens. The shells were only received after some years, and depedations of no small magnitude were made on the dry specimens, before they reached Dr. Gould