establishment, is the Zoological Station at Naples. The success of this great institution is due to the enthusiasm and ability of its founder and director, Dr. Anton Dohrn. This institution has been often described, so that something of its work is very generally known. But it is not well known that in Europe there is a large number of well-equipped and well-supported seaside laboratories. It is from these laboratories that the most important biological work of the present time is issuing.

In our own country the history of the seaside laboratory, while it contains some noteworthy undertakings and bids fair to have a brilliant career, is more briefly told. All naturalists are perfectly familiar with the first notable step in this direction made by Louis Agassiz at Penikese. The natural impetus which came to American biological studies from the inspiration engendered by this movement can never be overestimated. Since the death of Agassiz and the closing the school at Penikese, other very successful laboratories have been maintained on the Atlantic Coast, the results of which have been of great value to biological science. The most important and successful of these thus far have been those of the Marine Biological Laboratory and the Laboratory of the U. S. Fish Commission at Wood's Holl, Mass., and the one maintained by the Johns Hopkins University, which has been moved from point to point. Popular accounts of these have appeared at various times. The Marine Biological Laboratory, under the direction of Dr. Whitman, has been especially successful. It has developed very rapidly into a place where a considerable number of biological investigators with a large number of students assemble every year both for research and elementary study. This station is already regarded justly as a very important one and it contributes largely to the current of biological thought in this country. The commendable ambition of its eminent director, if backed as it should be, and no doubt will be, by proper financial support, will make the station at Wood's Holl even more a center for biological research than it is at present.

With all this activity in biological study pursued by modern methods, there is every reason why the splendid advantages of the Pacific Coast should be made to contribute to the progress of

the work. From the moment that the Leland Stanford Junior University proceeded as far in its organization as to have its first nucleus of a faculty appointed, the biologists of that number began to form plans for the establishing of a marine biological station somewhere on the coast. As soon as time from the work of forming new departments could be secured, Professors Gilbert and Jenkins began a search for the most desirable location for such a station. These examinations were carried on quietly, so that no outside influences might be brought to bear to change the choice of a location; the desire being to select a situation wholly on its merits as a suitable place for such a laboratory.

The points taken into the consideration in this selection were first, the natural advantages, then accessibility; and the facility of getting accommodations at which those engaged in the work could pleasantly and conveniently live.

The present location at Pacific Grove was the result of this selection. When it became public that such an institution was to be located on the coast, expressions indicating the most liberal spirit on the part of towns and citizens were volunteered. This shows that the enterprise has been started in a country where exists an intelligent and liberal people, who will not let it suffer for want of financial support.

The highest hope of those who have undertaken the enterprise was to make a very modest beginning and allow the Laboratory to develop by a process of growth, but with the full faith that the humble beginning would soon lead to a more pretentious development.

As soon as the site was selected, the town of Pacific Grove and the Pacific Improvement Company showed towards the proposed Laboratory a liberality which placed in the hands of the directors sufficient land and a considerable sum of money with which to begin operations. Mr. Timothy Hopkins soon took a great interest in the Laboratory and became its principal benefactor. In recognition of his hearty support and great interest in its establishment, the institution has been christened the Hopkins Seaside Laboratory.

With the financial support thus given it, the directors, last

spring, erected a laboratory consisting of a plain wooden structure of two stories, sixty by twenty-five feet.

It is located on the coast near the railroad station just next to what is known as "The Point," or Point Aulon. On the first floor are two general laboratories for elementary students, a storeroom and a library room. On the second floor is a third general laboratory and six private laboratories for investigators. The laboratories, both general and private, are furnished with aquaria, which are supplied with running sea-water. The sea-water is obtained from a source which allows it to be perfectly pure. The water is pumped by a gasoline engine to a tank from which the supply is distributed. The Laboratory is also abundantly furnished with excellent fresh water. The Laboratory possesses a very full supply of glassware and reagents. Whatever is needed in the way of microscopes, microtomes, embedding apparatus, and physiological apparatus is taken from the laboratories of Leland Stanford University for the summer. Of this supply there is a good stock to draw from. The Laboratory also possesses a limited amount of collecting apparatus and two boats.

Monterey Bay being a fishing station of considerable importance renders it possible to make use of many outside advantages for collecting.

The session of last summer was under the direction of Dr. C. H. Gilbert, Professor of Zoology, and Dr. O. P. Jenkins, Professor of Physiology and Histology of Leland Stanford Junior University. They were assisted by Mr. F. M. McFarland, Instructor in Histology, Mr. C. W. Greene, Assistant in Physiology, and Mr. B. M. Davis, Assistant in Botany in the same institution.

Seventeen students were in attendance, representing some half dozen States and several institutions of learning.

The experience of this, the first season, demonstrated clearly enough that the choice of the location is a fortunate one in every way. The forms of plants and animals are wonderfully rich in variety, in the numbers of individuals, in interest, in novelty, and in accessibility. It proves a perfect paradise for the marine biologist. Of course, a single season has only served as a beginning toward opening the gates to the treasures here to be gathered.

The size which some of the forms reach, while of less scientific interest than other of their features, renders them astonishing to those accustomed only to Atlantic forms. A species of Holothurian was brought in three feet in length, jelly fishes two feet in diameter, sea anemones which when open were eighteen inches in diameter, chitons, the giants of their race, twelve inches long, keyhole limpets that would weigh two pounds. Great chains of Salpa were obtained. The fishes of the bay are of great interest. Among the most common forms are various species of the surf fishes, of great interest from the fact that they bring forth their young alive.

Occasionally the bay is enlivened by the presence of whales, shoals of grampus and dolphins, and seals. But the character of this sketch will not permit an account of the life of the coast at this point, of the interesting land fauna and flora, and the beautiful scenery along the whole coast.

The Hopkins Seaside Laboratory while carried on under the auspices of the University is by no means to be regarded as simply a provision for members of that institution. Its advantages are planned for and freely offered to investigators from whatever source. In this work it is not to be at all looked upon as a rival to any of the well-equipped laboratories already in existence, but rather as a colaborer with them. The field it occupies is both unique and important. It would be a serious neglect of biological opportunities to leave it longer unoccupied. The problems which are now present on this Coast, and those which will open from time to time, will attract investigators from other regions. There is now a home provided for them.

Those of this coast engaged in biological study it is confidently expected will take a lively interest in the work of the Laboratory.

There is no field in science more inviting, nor more promising of large results, than those pertaining to the morphology and physiology of marine forms. The time has certainly arrived when those among us with scientific inclination and ambition can turn their attention with profit to these inviting fields. The work of the Laboratory thus far provides for three classes of people. Naturally students in the biological departments in the

University wish to extend their work in the Seaside Laboratory. They are made welcome. Besides these the Laboratory is open to teachers or those especially interested or prepared to carry on biological study. Especial welcome is given to investigators, those well trained in such work, who have problems relating to morphology or physiology of marine plants and animals which they are capable of working out. Among this class no doubt in time many eminent biologists will take their place. From the association and influence of such a class of men, biological study on the Pacific Coast will receive great gain. The teachers of biological science of the colleges and high schools of the Pacific Slope States should in time find in the Hopkins Seaside Laboratory what those of the Atlantic States find in the Marine Laboratory at Wood's Holl.

It is very obvious that to maintain such a station will require no small sum of money. But such important work and so well begun will not lack support. And most certainly the united moral support of those of the Pacific Coast States who are interested in the advance of science in general, and of biology in particular, may be most confidently counted upon.

THE BOTANICAL WRITINGS OF EDWARD L.
GREENE.

BY KATHARINE BRANDEGEE.

It has perhaps not escaped the notice of the botanical world that there is a very great difference of opinion in certain points, especially in the number of species belonging to the Californian flora, between Mr. Greene and his pupils on the one hand and nearly all the remaining Western botanists on the other. Some explanation of the causes of this difference may be of interest.

All of Mr. Greene's work tends to the inordinate multiplication of species, and his species are, as a rule, so imperfectly described that no one without a close acquaintance with the flora or access to the types is able to make out his meaning. It seems to suit his convenience, wherever there is the slightest ground for difference, to at once describe a new species as vaguely as