258 CARNEGIE INSTITUTION 



tions of Japai; are complete tcrrae iiicogmtae as far as the higher 

 animals are concerned ; thus, for instance, the whole large island of 

 Siiikoku. The Japanese themselves have had so many other prob- 

 lems to solve that their scientific activity has as yet yielded but slight 

 results in our direction. 



(<r) Kamchatka. — As for the peninsula of Ivamchatka, very little 

 biological v/ork has been done there. One of the present v.'riters 

 has had the good fortune to be able to collect at one place in the 

 southern part and has published on the birds of the region. He was 

 enabled to draw some general conclusions as to the character of the 

 fauna, and to indicate, although in a very tentative way, the insular 

 nature of its biota, conclusions since corroborated by an eminent 

 geologist. But beyond these hesitating suggestions nothing definite 

 can be asserted from lack of extensive and positive information. 



{d) Kurd Isii.mds. — The Kuril Islands, which now form the con- 

 necting link between Kamchatka and Japan, have not yet been 

 reached by the modern biologist, except that a Japanese botanist lias 

 given an account of the flora to a great extent based on antiquated 

 informatioji, while one of the present writers has published a pre- 

 liminary account of the birds, also based to a great extent upon old 

 and uncontrollable records, his own visit having been too brief for 

 any extensive collecting. 



Sakhalin has been studied to some extent by Russian scientists, 

 but the results are partly inaccessible because in the Russian lan- 

 guage, and because the material collected is nov/ scattered. 



{e) Mainland of Eastern Asia. — The adjacent portions of the 

 Asiatic mainland, the tracts adjoining the Okhotsk Sea, and the 

 Amur region are among the most important localities for the eluci- 

 dation of the questions we propose to solve. Fifty years ago they 

 were the scene of the explorations of Middendorf, Schrenck, and 

 Radde, and at that time our knowledge of those regions WdS ahead 

 of that of our own great West. How different today! Biological 

 science has taken a new start since the days of those pioneers, and 

 excellent as rheir work was for that time, it is utterly antiquated and 

 inadequate toda}'. Nothing worth speaking of has been added, and 

 for prcseiit p-arposes the work is nearly useless because of its 

 lack of detail and the absence of sufficient m.aterial in large series 

 to snbstaiiiiate tJie results. 



These large series of specimens from the entire circumpolar area 

 are among the greatest desiderata of biologisis dealing v.'ith these 

 nroblenis. There is no museum in America which has even a repre- 



