288 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1924 



Azores had theirs in one place and those of Madeira in another? 

 If this were so, then where were the first-year larvse of the enor- 

 mous hosts of eels from the Continent of Europe ? For it must be 

 remembered that the Norwegian expedition with its effective fishing 

 apparatus had taken comparatively very few larvoe of the smaller 

 group, while Captain Andrea's large collection of Leptocephali con- 

 tained but two specimens of the European eel. And, finally, there 

 was the natural question: how old were the smallest larvte, 

 with their length of just over 4 cm. This question was obviously 

 of great importance, since if the larvae were some few months old, 

 they might have been carried great distances during that time by the 

 ocean currents, and in such cases it would be impossible to deter- 

 mine, for instance, whether the lar^^se found south of the Azores 

 had originally come from somewhere farther to the east or some- 

 where farther west. 



Considering these points, I perceived that if the problem were to 

 be solved in anything like a satisfactory manner it would be neces- 

 sary to ascertain, not only where the youngest larvae were to be 

 foimd, but also where they were not. Until a comprehensive sur- 

 vey had been obtained as to the distribution and respective density 

 of the various sizes of larvae in all parts of the sea, it would hardly 

 be possible to form definite conclusions as to the origin of the eels 

 of our European Continent. The task was thus one of enormous 

 dimensions, albeit with the consolation that the South Atlantic might 

 be disregarded as being devoid of any representative of the genus 

 Anguilla, a fact which I had been able to prove in my previously 

 mentioned work on the distribution of this genus throughout the 

 world (1909, loc. cit.). 



In order to proceed further, then, it was evidently necessai-y to 

 procure observations from the greatest possible area of the North 

 Atlantic. As I have already stated, the 2'hor was useless for such 

 work as this; I had, therefore, to endeavor to procure the requisite 

 material by other means. In pursuance of the project, application 

 was made from time to time to one and another of the Danish ship- 

 owning companies with vessels sailing regularly on trans- Atlantic 

 routes, requesting that the ships might occasionally be allowed to 

 draw a pelagic net for half an hour, and send in the resulting cap- 

 tures for investigation. Our request was on the whole very cour- 

 teously complied with, and during the years 1911-1915 hauls were 

 made at about 550 "stations" by 23 different vessels, steamers, and 

 sailing ships, of Danish nationality, one of them belonging to the 

 Danish royal navy. A chart of the stations^ shows that they are 



*" stations ia the Atlantic, etc.," with two charts and introductory remarks ("Meddel- 

 elser fra Kommissioncn for Llavundersogelser, SerLe Fislseri," vol. 5, no. 7, Copen- 

 hagen, 1919). 



