556 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



THE BEKMUDA ISLANDS AND THE BERMUDA BIO- 

 LOGICAL STATION FOR RESEARCH. II. 



By Professor EDWARD L. MARK, 



DIRECTOR OF THE ZOOLOGICAL LABORATORY OF HARVARD UNIVERSITY. 



BEFORE speaking about the life in the seas I wish to say a few 

 words about the Bermuda Marine Laboratory. Not very long 

 after my conversations with President .Eliot, and when I was con- 

 sidering ways and means of providing an opportunity for students to 

 work at Bermuda, I had the good fortune to make the acquaintance 

 of Professor Bristol, and hear from him for the first time a glowing 

 account of his experiences of several years, and his plans and hopes 

 regarding a somewhat similar undertaking. Our aims had so much 

 in common that cooperation seemed desirable to both of ^us, and we 

 at length agreed to undertake, with the aid of the Bermuda Natural 

 History Society, to equip and manage a provisional laboratory, which 

 might serve till such time as the colonial government should be able 

 to put at the disposal of biologists a permanent station. Chiefly 

 through the enthusiastic interest of Dr. Bristol, in cooperation with 

 the Bermuda Natural History Society, the colonial government had 

 been led to entertain the idea of establishing a public aquarium for the 

 enlightenment and amusement of people resident in the islands as well 

 as the tourists, and in connection with it a marine laboratory for 

 biological investigations. A joint committee of the Legislative Coun- 

 cil and the House of Assembly, consisting of Sir S. Brownlow Gray, 

 chief justice, Hon. Eyre Hutson, colonial secretary, and assemblymen 

 J. H. Trimingham, Nathaniel Vesey and A. Gosling, was appointed to 

 consider the advisability of establishing such a station, and in due 

 time reported favorably on the undertaking. The governor, Lieut- 

 General Geary, at the suggestion of the committee, entered into corre- 

 spondence with many institutions and individuals in both Europe and 

 America, with a view to ascertaining their opinions as to the desirability 

 of establishing such a station and the possibility of their cooperation. 

 The replies were all favorable, and a certain amount of support was 

 promised. Early in 1903 Professor Bristol and I were invited by 

 the Natural History Society to visit Bermuda for the purpose of 

 looking into the conditions and giving advice with regard to the gen- 

 eral plan and certain matters of detail. This we did toward the end 

 of April. Upon our return, and after the money necessary for the 

 undertaking had been secured, we issued to biologists in the name of 



