MARINE BIOLOGICAL STATION AT PORT ERIN. 169 



looked after the place for the last couple of years. They 

 feel also that the presence of a scientific man constantly 

 at Port Erin will result in an improvement in the 

 Aquarium and in the experimental fish hatching. The 

 collecting and recording of specimens and physical obser- 

 vations which has depended so much in the past upon the 

 chance visits of members of the Committee and other 

 investigators ought, under a resident naturalist, to become 

 systematised, and yield valuable results. The Committee 

 consider they are fortunate in having been able to arrange 

 with Mr. H. C. Chadwick — formerly of Owens College, and 

 for some time Assistant Curator in the Bootle Museum — 

 that he shall go into residence at Port Erin at the beginning 

 of the new year, and shall devote his attention, in addition 

 to the routine duties of the post, to a series of observations 

 and investigations upon lines drawn up by the Committee. 



It is becoming more evident year by year that both for 

 the purposes of scientific Biology and also in the interests 

 of fishery questions we must endeavour to gain a more 

 intimate and detailed knowledge of the statistics of com- 

 munities or assemblages of animals on the sea-floor, and 

 of their habits and inter-relations. 



A couple of years ago we published* some statistics of 

 dredging on different grounds. This work should be con- 

 tinued and extended. Mr. A. 0. Walker has lately + made 

 comparison between the fauna on shallow and that on deep 

 mud, in our area, with the result that the shallow mud 

 shows by far the greater number of genera, species, and 

 specimens of Crustacea. That is a valuable opinion, but 

 refers to one group of organisms only. The individual 

 members of our Committee are specialists — each with his 



* Ninth Annual Report, p. 25, 1896. 

 + Liverpool Biological Society, November, 1897. 



