514 THE ^[ARINE BIOLOGICAL STATIONS OF EUROPE. 



the laboratory while perlia])s in Geriminy, when he secured the privi- 

 lege of a table. He is told of the best method of reaching Naples, the 

 precautions he must take to secure the safe arrival of his boxes and 

 instruments. He is told to send directions as to the material he desires 

 for study; he is notified of the sup})lies which will be allowed him, and 

 of the matters of hotels, lodging, and banking, necessary even to a 

 biologist. At the tirst sight of tlie building he is impressed most fav- 

 orably, and it is not long before he comes to look upon his work-place 

 as his particular home, open to him day, uight, and holiday. He likes 

 the general air of quietness — in no little way significant of system in 

 every branch of the station's organization ; his neighbors are friendly, 

 and ho feels that even the attendants are willing, often anxious to give 

 him help. 



At present the station at Naples consists of two buildings, the first, 

 shown in the foreground in the accompanying illustration (PL xxxi), 

 is the older, the main building ; behind it is the newly built jihysiological 

 laboratory. In the basement of the main building is the aquarium, 

 well managed, open to the public, and eagerly visited. Passing into 

 the aiiuarium room from the main entrance, one descends into a long, 

 dark, concreted room, lighted only through wall tanks brilliant on 

 every side with varied forms of life. There are in all about two dozen 

 large a(piaria embedded in the walls of the sides and of the main i)ar- 

 tition of the room. The water is clear and blue. The background in 

 each aquaria, built of rock work, catches the light from above and 

 throws in clear relief the living inmates. The first tank will perhaps 

 be full of starfish and sea urchins, bright in color, often clustered on 

 the glass each with a dim halo of pale, thread-like feet. In the back- 

 ground may be a living clump of crinoids, flowering out like a garden 

 of bright-colored lilies. 



In a neighboring tank, rich with dark-colored seaweeds, will be a 

 group of flyiug gurnards, reddish and brilliantly spotted, feeling cau- 

 tiously along the bottom with the finger like rays of their wing-shaped 

 fins. Here, too, may be squids, delicate and fish-like, swimming timidly 

 upand down ; perhaps a series of hugetriton snails below amid clustered 

 eggs of cuttlefish. In another tank would be a bank of sea anemones 

 with all the large and brilliant forms common to southern waters. 

 Here may be corals in the background and a forest of sea fans in orange, 

 red, and yellow, with a precious fringe of pink coral, flowering out in 

 yellow star-like polyps. There may again be a host of ascidians, deli- 

 cate, transparent, solitary forms, the lanky Ciona, the brilliantly crim- 

 son Cynthia, and huge masses of varied, compound forms. Swimming 

 in the water may be chains of Salpa and occasionally a number of 

 Amphioxus; the latter, as they from time to time emerge from the sandy 

 bottom, flurry about as if with sudden fright, (juickly to disappear. 

 Variety is one of the striking characters of neighboring tanks. In oue, 

 brilliant forms will outvie the colors of their neighbors; in another, the 



