256 CATALOGUE OF ECHINI. 



Caribbean Sea, from 18 77 to 1880, the Museum has received a nearly 

 complete series of all the species. Many specimens have also been 

 obtained from the southern and western coasts of Florida by Mr. Henry 

 Hemphill and Dr. Edward Palmer, who spent considerable time in that 

 region, in the service of the Museum, from 1883 to 1885. 



For Alaskan Echini the Museum is chiefly indebted to Mr. William 

 H. Dall, who, during his several visits to Alaska and the adjacent waters 

 of Siberia, made very extensive collections both from the shore and by 

 dredging, thereby securing an exceedingly large number of specimens 

 of this group. Other materials from the Alaskan region have been 

 sent in by observers of the U. S. Signal Service, by the officers of the 

 U. S. revenue steamer Corwin, and by several naval ofhcers. 



From the western coast of North America south of Alaska, valuable 

 specimens have been contributed by Mr. J. G. Swan, from Puget Sound, 

 Neeah Bay, and British Columbia ; by Prof. D. S. Jordan, while in the 

 service of the U. S. Fish Commission, from Washington Territory and 

 California ; by Mr. A. Forrer and Prof. R. E. C. Stearns, from Califor- 

 nia, Lower California, and Mexico ; by Mr. John Xantus and Mr. L. 

 Belding, from Lower California and Mexico; and by Lieut. Commander 

 H. E. Nichols, U. S. N., from various sources. The collection of Echini 

 obtained by Mr. John Xantus at the southern extremity of California 

 was, at the time it was made (1859 to 1861), one of the most important 

 that had been procured from that region, and a large number of his 

 specimens are still preserved in the Museum in good condition. 



So far as the writer is aware, no account has ever been published of 

 the collection of Echini made by the Wilkes United States Exploring 

 Expedition around the world, from 1838 to 1842, and it is now impossi- 

 ble to determine how extensive that collection may have been. The 

 very valuable zoological materials obtained on that cruise, including the 

 Crustacea and Zoophytes described by Dana and the Mollusks described 

 by Gould, did not come into the possession of the IVIuseum until several 

 years after they left the hands of the naturalists engaged in studying 

 them, and in the mean time they snffered greatly from the destruction 

 of specimens and the loss ot labels, dne to insufficient accommodations 

 in the store rooms in which they were kept. They received further 

 damage at the time of the Smithsonian fire in 1805, and at the burning 

 of the museum of the Chicago Academy of Science in 187 L Only a 

 few specimens of Echini that can be referred to that Ex])edition have 

 been found in the Museum collection, and these are all di^nudcd tests, 

 mostly without other indication of their origin than the simple inscrip- 

 tion "U". S. Ex. Ex.," written directly upon the specimen. 



The Echini collected by the North Pacific Exploring Expedition, Dr. 

 William Stimpson naturalist, from 1853 to 1856, fared somewhat better, 

 notwithstanding the fact that the Crustaceans and Mollusks were al- 

 most entirely destroyed in the great Chicago fire above referred to. 

 This expedition visited numerous islands in the Pacific Ocean, and the 

 eastern coast of Asia as far north as Kamtchatka and Bering Strait: 



