428 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



electric ray in an open shallow tank, and by putting the thumb above 

 and the fingers under the animal's flat shoulders, whilst we pull or 

 squeeze the tail with the other hand, an electric shock can be obtained. 

 Octopus, Squids and other Cuttlefish are present in abundance ; crabs 

 that mimic their surroundings, those with anemones and with sponges 

 on their backs, animals that look like plants, corals and sea-fans of 

 many kinds, worms that live in leathery tubes a foot long and expand 

 out of the top, like gorgeous flowers six inches across with innumerable 

 spirally-arranged petals — these seem to be the favorites with visitors. 

 But probably the most interesting tanks to the scientific man are those 

 containing the recently caught 'plankton,' the Medusas and other deli- 

 cate and gelatinous surface organisms. There is one marvelous crea- 

 ture that can be seen almost nowhere else, the Cestus veneris, which 

 is like an undulating, pulsating band of light, in some positions abso- 

 lutely transparent, in others flashing iridescent fire like a diamond 

 from its sides. So much for the public aquarium, which, at an admis- 

 sion fee of two francs, brings in to the institution a revenue of about 

 £1,000 a year. Now a word as to the publications of the station. 



Workers at Naples are free to publish the results of their investi- 

 gations where they like, and records of the good work in all depart- 

 ments of biology which has been done at this station are to be found 

 in all civilized countries in the form of memoirs and articles contributed 

 to the scientific periodicals of the world. But still a considerable 

 amount of the whole, including a number of the more extended, more 

 solid and more noteworthy contributions, has been published at Naples 

 as a noble series of monographs on the 'Fauna and Flora of the Gulf 

 of Naples' — each monograph being one or more quarto volumes, richly 

 illustrated, and dealing with one particular group of animals, or a 

 section thereof. This great series, of which 26 monographs have now 

 appeared, is amongst the most cherished possessions of every zoological 

 library. Besides these monographs fourteen volumes of a smaller 

 yearly journal, the 'Mittheilungen,' have been published containing 

 shorter but still important papers, and Dr. Paul Mayer also edits a 

 yearly summary or record, the 'Zoologischer Jahresbericht,' of the ad- 

 vances made in all departments of zoology in all parts of the world. 



But although the work of the Naples Zoological Station is thus 

 many-sided, the leading idea is certainly original research. An in- 

 vestigator usually goes to Naples to make some particular discovery, 

 and he goes there because he knows he will find material, facilities and 

 environment such as exist nowhere else in the same favorable combina- 

 tion. As a result of the splendid pioneer work which Dr. Dohrn has 

 flone at Naples, every civilized country has now established its own 

 biological stations, some larger, some smaller ; but although these are of 

 prime importance amongst scientific institutions, as enabling the young 



