2 TRANSACTIONS LIVERPOOL BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



moreover these marine forms have given rise in the past 

 to the land and fresh water animals, and also to those 

 of the deep sea — they are the parent community from 

 which migrating swarms have been given off; it is 

 amongst these marine animals romid coasts that there 

 has been the greatest over-crowding and the most severe 

 struggle for existence, and it is there probably that, under 

 the stress of competition, important new habits and struc- 

 tures have been evolved and modified. Many of the 

 great biological discoveries and generalizations have been 

 made from the study of marine animals, and many of the' 

 problems which still await solution, some of them theor- 

 etical questions of the greatest general interest, will 

 probably have to be worked out in the abundant and 

 varied material which presents itself to the marine biolo- 

 gist. Then again the sea is so large, and so comparatively 

 unknown that there is much more chance of coming upon 

 interesting new forms of life there than elsewhere. 

 Finally it should not be forgotten that we are a maritime 

 nation, that we most of us take kindly to the sea, and 

 that we naturally regard it as a duty to thoroughly explore 

 our coast lines, to examine the sea bottom lying off our 

 shores and make known the conditions of existence and 

 the various kinds of plants and animals living within the 

 British Area. Probably these reasons sufficiently account 

 for marine biology having flourished for the last century 

 in this country and for the fact that there have always 

 been amongst British Naturalists, enthusiastic investi- 

 gators of the sea bottom by means of the dredge and the 

 trawl. 



L si Kill merely add that although Aristotle collected 

 marine animals on the shores of Asia Minor more than 

 2000 years ago, and it is over a century since the Danish 

 Naturalist 0. F. Miiller invented a dredae for scientific 



