EXPI.ORATION AND STUDY OF THE TROPICAL 



PACIFIC OCEAN 



By Alexander Agassiz 



Museum of Comparative Zoology, 



Cambridge, Mass., September, 24, 1902. 

 My Dear Dr. Billings : 



In accordance with my promise, I send 3^ou a short sketch of what 

 might be accomplished by an expedition which would spend about 

 three years in the tropical Pacific. 



The points of interest are the hydrographic study of that area of 

 the Pacific east of a line running from San Francisco to the Paumo- 

 tus and from the Paumotus to the central part of Peru. With the 

 exception of some work which I did in Central America off Panama 

 and the Galapagos in 1891, from the Gulf of California to the north- 

 ern part of Ecuador, nothing is known of the depth and character 

 of the bottom of that great area. In connection with this work 

 dredging should be carried on west of the area which I occupied 

 into the deepest water of the eastern Pacific basin. The extension 

 of the surface fauna in depth from the shore into deep water should 

 also be investigated. The Central American coast north and south 

 of the equator is admirably fitted for such study on account of its 

 steep slope and the short distance to deep water from the coast. 



Next, some time should be spent in dredging from the central 

 part of each group of oceanic islands into deep water until one 

 reached the abysmal fauna of the bottom of the Pacific to get thus 

 some idea of the contrast there may be or the affinities, as may be the 

 case, between these insular oceanic faunae and the Pacific deep water 

 fauna. The groups to be examined are Alassason, the Society, the 

 Paumotus, the Marquesas, the Cook, Samoa, Fiji, the Ellice group, 

 Marshall and Carolines. 



With this should be carried on deep sea tow net work and the 

 study of the pelagic fauna associated with each group of islands. A 

 study of the pelagic fauna should be made along the line of the 

 equatorial and other great currents. The geology, botany, anthropol- 

 ogy, and ethnology of these various archipelagoes should be studied. 

 The time is coming, if it has not already come, when the natives of 

 these various groups will have adopted the ways of modern civiliza- 

 tion. It will then be imipossible to learn anything of their former 



(272) 



