VI INTRODUCTION. . 



In December, 1891, I set out upon a winding journey around 

 the world, first spending the winter on the Hawaiian Islands, where 

 I made some collections of shells, thence proceeded to Japan, where 

 the following summer was passed. Here I traveled more exten- 

 sively than during my former visit, the itinerary covering almost 

 the entire length of the Empire, from the Province of Satsuma in 

 the south, to Sapporo, the capital of the Island of Yezzo, in the 

 north. 



Profiting by the experience of my first visit, I availed myself of 

 the assistance of coast-fishermen in collecting the rarer forms of 

 mollusks, and, while the territory covered does not greatly exceed 

 that of the earlier visit, much new material was obtained. 



My Japanese collector, Morita Seto, spent a year — 1891-2 — in 

 the Loo Choo Islands, collecting shells. But, as the fauna of that 

 Archipelago is more closely allied to that of the Indo-Pacific region 

 than the fauna of the Japanese waters, the results of the expedition 

 were not so valuable as anticipated. 



In conclusion it should be stated that I have spent an active 

 business life as a manufacturing pharmacist, until circumstances 

 permitted me within recent years to retire from active work in that 

 profession, and devote ray advanced years to travel, and to at least 

 a superficial study of natural history ; and hence I beg to be con- 

 sidered only as an amateur in conchology, and the public will 

 understand that whatever of scientific merit this volume possesses, 

 is due to ray friend and editor Prof H. A. Pilsbry. 



Note: — Very many of the species enumerated in this Cata- 

 logue, to which my name is attached as collector, may be had in 

 exchange by conchologists and collectors. Upon application, 

 printed lists of such duplicates will be forwarded. Many species of 

 which but few specimens were obtained upon my first visit, were 

 found more abundantly on the second. 



Frederick Stearns, 



Detroit, Michigan, 

 U. S. A. 



