EDITORIAL NOTE. 



The Holothurians described by Dr. Koehler in this Report were collected 

 by the successive Surgeon -Naturalists of the surveying vessel " Investigator" 

 between the years 1887 and 1901. 



A brief history of the ship, so far as her subordinate connexion with zoolo- 

 gical research goes, is to be found in the Account of the Deep-sea, Madreporaria 

 collected by the Eoyal Indian Marine Survey Ship Investigator, published by order 

 of the Trustees of the Indian Museum in 1898. 



With regard to Dr. Koehler's remarks upon the bad state of preservation 

 of the material with which he has had to deal, I may, perhaps, be permitted to 

 mention that deep-sea Holothurians are excessively difficult to preserve in any 

 circumstances ; but that in a tropical climate, where sea-things begin to suffer 

 strange changes within an hour of their capture, a single amazed naturalist, with 

 all the miscellaneous contents of the trawl demanding instant attention, has 

 really no time to spare for a single rather exacting group : it is as much as he 

 can do to get all his specimens, without favour, washed clear of mud, or cut away 

 from the tangles, and transferred wholesale to some simple and safe preserva- 

 tive such as strong spirits of wine before they begin to decompose. More- 

 over, quite apart from any feasability of choosing preservatives, it commonly 

 happens that, owing to the rapidity with which the deep-sea-trawl is now-a-days 

 dragged through the water by the artless wire-rope, delicate objects, like deep- 

 sea Holothurians, are often badly damaged before they reach the surface. 



Eor the care which Dr. Koehler has bestowed upon a collection so ad- 

 versely affected by fortune, all those who are interested in the " Investigator " 

 and the Indian Museum are greatly obliged to him. 



A. ALCOCK, Major, I. M. S., 

 Superintendent of the Indian Museum, 

 Natural History Section. 



