440 LOmS F. DE POURTALfes. 



any deposits strictly corresponding to those now fornaing at tlie bot- 

 tom of the ocean in great depths. 



Mr. Pourtales was indeed the pioneer of deep-sea dredging in 

 America, and he lived long enough to see that these earlier expeditions 

 had paved the way not only for similar English, French, and Scan- 

 dinavian researches, but had led in this country to the Hassler and 

 finally to the Blake expeditions under the auspices of the Hon. 

 Carlile Patterson, the present Superintendent of our Coast Survey. 

 On the Hassler Expedition, from Massachusetts Bay through the 

 Straits of Magellan to California, he had entire charge of the dredging 

 operations. Owing to circumstances beyond his control, the deep-sea 

 explorations of that expedition were not as successful as he antici- 

 pated. 



At the death of his father, Mr. Pourtales was left in an independent 

 position, which allowed him to devote himself more completely than 

 ever to his zoological studies. He resigned his official connection with 

 the Coast Survey, and returned to Cambridge, where he became 

 thenceforth identified with the progress of the Museum of Comparative 

 Zoology. To Professor Agassiz his presence there was invaluable. 

 In youth one of his favorite pupils, throughout life his friend and col- 

 league, he now became the support of his failing strength. 



Mr. Pourtales reserved to himself the corals, Halcyonarians, Holo- 

 thurians, and Crinoids, of the different deep-sea dredging expeditions 

 with which he was connected. A number of his papers on the deep- 

 sea corals of Florida, of the Caribbean Sea, and of the Gulf of 

 Mexico, have appeared in the Museum publications. The Crinoid 

 memoirs published by him relate to a few new species of Comatulaj, 

 and to the interesting genera Rhizocriiius and Holopus. 



At the time of his death Mr. Pourtales was engaged in the study 

 of the Holothurians and the magnificent collection of Halcyonarians 

 of the Blake. Unfortunately he had not advanced far enough in 

 his preliminary work to make its completion possible ; so that the 

 Holothurians of the Blake will now be worked up with those of 

 the Challenger, while the Halcyonarians must be left uudetermiued 

 for the present, the Antipatharia alone having been finished. 



His largest and most important work is his monograi)h on the deep- 

 sea corals, published as one of the illustrated catalogues of the Mu- 

 seum of Comparative Zoology. This was published in 1871, and in 

 it he describes the corals he collected in the years 1867-1869, while 

 on the Coast Survey expeditions to explore the Gulf Stream. As an 

 introduction to the memoir, we find a short resume of the conditions of 



