A SKETCH OF HIS LIFE 19 



the large number of papers which they published. Doctor Brooks 

 expected all of his graduate students to spend a season or more 

 at this laboratory. He rightly estimated such work as the most 

 valuable experience a beginner could have, for in this way the 

 student became acquainted with animals under natural condi- 

 tions; he had the opportunity of laying a broad foundation for 

 his future work as a naturalist, of finding for himself some matters 

 to investigate, and thus early to acquire the mental habit of the 

 independent investigator. 



The Chesapeake Laboratory, as said, was not limited to one 

 place. For the first few years of its existence it was located at 

 several different points on Chesapeake Bay; afterwards it was 

 located at Beaufort, North Carolina; then at different places in 

 the Bahama Islands, and finally in Jamaica. In the various 

 expeditions of Brooks and his students to these different places 

 they made not only a biological sarvey of each region, but they 

 did work of most fundamental and far-reaching importance 

 on the various groups of animals found. Out of these expeditions 

 has grown the beautiful and permanent station of the U. S. 

 Fisheries Bureau at Beaufort, North Carolina, in which Brooks 

 took great interest and pride. It was on these expeditions that 

 his students came to know him most intimately and affectionately. 

 In the memory of each of them is fixed some scene of his enthu- 

 siasm over the discovery of a rare form or of an unknown stage in 

 some life history; his long vigils full of exciting discoveries; his 

 quiet talks on nature and philosophy. 



The Chesapeake Zoological Laboratory occupied so large a 

 place in the life and work of Professor Brooks that it seems desir- 

 able to reproduce here, in his own words, a more detailed account 

 of the aims and history of that laboratory during, its first nine 

 years. The following is taken from a report by Professor Brooks 

 on "The Zoological Work of the Johns Hopkins University, 1878- 

 86," published in the Johns Hopkins University Circulars, vol. 

 6, No. 54: 



In natural science the policy of the University is to promote the study 

 of life, rather than to accumulate specimens: and since natural laws are 

 best studied in their simplest manifestations, much attention has been 



