142 . — SIR W. A. HERDMAN : RESULTS OF CONTINUOUS 
the methods*. Ithen found that for facility of working and efficiency it 
was desirable to have a vessel and erew devoted specially to the work and on 
board which one could live and make more extended cruises, and keep all 
the necessary apparatus, &e., for working various kinds of nets and for 
preserving and examining collections. So from 1907 to 1914 (inclusive) the 
investigations were carried on from the steam-yachts * Ladybird’ (1907-10) 
and * Runa’ (1911-14)—especially the latter larger boat, in which with the 
most efficient help of the skipper Mr. James Crebbin we had the necessary 
gear for sounding, dredging, trawling, tow-netting, and the working of 
various special nets, water-bottles, &e., arranged so as to work smoothly and 
rapidly. During and since the years of war such continuation of the work 
as was found possible has been carried on from the 27-foot cutter motor-boat 
‘Redwing.’ 
In the case of most of these special collections taken from my own boats 
I was able to make a hurried microscopic examination of a sample from each 
haul in the living condition, and take a few notes of the nature and quantity 
of the gathering and of the prevalent organisms. In all cases, both “official” 
and “special,” the gatherings (except when for safety they had to be pre- 
served on board the yacht) were dealt with, fixed, bottled, and labelled by 
Mr. H. C. Chadwick, A.L.S., at the Port Erin Biological Station. The 
collections were subsequently worked over microscopically by Mr. Andrew 
Scott, A.L.S., and the numbers of each organism identified were counted or 
estimated and entered on our printed tabular forms, which were then sent to 
me for analysis and comparison with the other weeks, months, and years of 
the accumulating series. In all this work at Liverpool I had much help 
from my then secretary, Miss H. M. Lewis, B.A., who supplied me with the 
totals and averages I required, and drew up tables and graphs under my 
direction. | 
The results of each year were published annually in the Reports of the 
Lancashire Sea-Fisheries Laboratory at the University of Liverpool + for 
the years 1907-1921 ; but, for the most part, general results and conclusions 
were postponed until the completion of the series. Now that I have retired 
from active work at the University and the direction of the Port Erin 
Station, and have handed over the collection of upwards of 7500 plankton 
samples, and a corresponding number of tabular records, to the Department 
of Oceanography—where no doubt, in the hands of Prof. Johnstone, they 
will undergo further analysis and, I hope, yield good results,—it may be of 
some interest to those who are conducting plankton research elsewhere that 
I should give without further delay a brief summary of our records and some 
account of the conclusions at which I have arrived as the result of the 
fifteen years’ * intensive” work. 
* The results of that work in 1906 are not included in this survey of fifteen years, 
T Trans. Biol. Soc. Liverpool, vols. xxii.-xxxv. 
