and Laboratory Methods. 1355 



warrant greater expenditure in apparatus and material. A house boat would be a 

 great convenience and of great utility. The great needs of the station, in order 

 to secure the best results, are more extensive working material and a longer 

 working period. For many years the station will be a place for investigation 

 rather than a summer school for students. Its best work will be done by mak- 

 ing provision for both. There is excellent opportunity to establish a station on 

 a larger scale, in a region offering great variety of life, from Alpine to that at 

 3000 feet altitude, and from swamp to barren hill. It is hoped the income of 

 the university will warrant the increased expenditure at an early date. While 

 there is no comparison between the life of the region and that of a favorable 

 ocean locality, the problems offered are of a different nature, fully as interesting, 

 and quite as important. Nowhere is there better opportunity to study 

 variation and its effects than in mountain regions. 



The work of the coming season will be better than in preceding years. In 

 addition to the work of the director. Principal P. M. Silloway, of the Fergus 

 county, Montana, Free High School, will have charge of work in ornithology, 

 which he did so ably the past season. Maurice Ricker, principal of the Burling- 

 ton, Iowa, High School, will give the instruction in nature study and physiography. 

 The New York Botanical Garden will cooperate in the botanical work of the sta- 

 tion. Dr. D. T. MacDougal, director of the laboratories in that institution, will 

 join the party in the field for the purpose of making collections and pursuing 

 some investigations ^upon the results of climate and vegetation, and will continue 

 both lines of work at the station. The botanical work during the session will be 

 under his guidance. Attention will be given to general botany, and to the spec- 

 ial features of the flora of Montana. Mr. R. S. Williams, of the same institution, 

 will spend the month of June making collections in the northwestern part of 

 the state, and will be present during a part of the session, giving special atten- 

 tion to mosses and ferns. 



During the five or six weeks previous to the opening of the station the 

 instructors will devote their time to collecting in the immediate region. An 

 outfit has been provided which will make the trip quite comfortable, and the 

 entire time will be devoted to collecting in different fields, from snowy mountain 

 summits to the marshes of the lakes and rivers. During this trip additional col- 

 lections will be made in lakes not yet visited, and in regions where collectors 

 have not yet been. After the collecting trip the party will proceed to the station, 

 and will take care of the students attending, at the same time continuing the 

 collecting and making additional observations. 



The collecting trip is made possible through a contribution from Hon. Wm. 

 A. Clark, who has contributed annually for this purpose, and to whom the sta- 

 tion is greatly indebted. The purchase of the boats, erection of building, and 

 expense of the instructors during the past two years has been met by contribu- 

 tions from friends, the principal contributors being E. L. Bonner, H. W. Ham- 

 mond, A. B. Hammond, Dr. W. P. Mills, W. P. Murphy, and W. A. Clark. 

 The expense for the coming summer, in addition to the contribution by Senator 

 Clark, will be met by university appropriation. 



