Prospectus. 



The undersigned, who for many years has been especially engaged in 

 the study of the various groups of Crustacea, and who, on his many journeys 

 of research, has been enabled to make himself especially familiar with tlie 

 species represented in the northern fauna, hereby begs to invite Norwegian 

 and foreign zoologists to subscribe to a complete work on the Crustacea of 

 Norway. In this work, the author will characterise, as concisely as possible, 

 all the Norwegian species hitherto known and, what is of great importance, 

 the descriptions will be accompanied by carefully drawn figures of all the 

 forms. The lack of good plates has hitherto made the study of this interesting 

 class of animals very difficult, and, in many cases, has caused sad confusion in 

 the synonymy. It is now the author's intention to try to make the species 

 belonging to the fauna of Norway easily recognisable and definable, which, 

 much better than by the most elaborate descriptions, may undoubtedly be 

 brought about by habitus figures, true to nature, and of sufficient size and 

 cleai'ness. All the plate.s will be prepared by the author himself, by the 

 autographic method applied by him very successfully during a series of 

 years; and as bj^ this means the expense of lithographing will be avoided, 

 the work can be delivered, richly illustrated, at a comparatively low price. 

 As the state of affairs at our University, for the time, is not such as to allow 

 one to suppose that a work of this extent can be expected to be published 

 by the University within a reasonable time, the author is obliged to adopt 

 the mode of publication suggested here, and does not doubt but that the 

 undertaking will meet with a favourable reception by foreign zoologists, and 

 that no difficulties will arise to prevent its being completed at a comparatively 

 early date. To obtain as large a distribution as possible it will be written 

 entirely in the English language. — As stated, the letterpress descriptions 

 will be as concise as possible, and will be chiefly confined to short diagnoses 

 of the families, genera and species, critical remarks as to the synonyms, and 

 information as to occurrence and distribution of the species. ^ The utmost 



