AN ENGLISH BIOLOGICAL STATION. 155 
public. Naturally the views and aims of the management and of 
the presiding naturalist clashed, and the latter had either to adapt 
himself to the leading purpose of the establishment, or to resign. At 
all events it finally became evident to biologists that science could 
expect little help from the ordinary aquarium, which was no more 
than a handmaid to the amusement of the public. To accomplish 
her noble purposes she must be mistress. We believe the French 
were the first to recognise this important truth, and to establish a 
station solely for the purpose of investigating the habits, organisa- 
tion, and surroundings of the denizens of the ocean. Now they 
have quite a number of such stations in operation—as, for instance, 
at Roscoff, Concarneau, Villefranche, and Cette. The Austrian 
government maintains a similar station at Trieste, while in America 
the Johns Hopkins University has one at Beaufort, and Professor 
Alexander Agassiz another at Newport. The Dutch have for 
several years had a travelling laboratory erected during the summer 
months at different parts of their coasts. But undoubtedly the 
finest institution of the kind is that founded ten years ago at 
Naples by a German biologist, Dr. Anton Dohrn, to the work of 
which we have at various times referred in our columns. The 
Naples station is, indeed, an international institution, for although 
it is subsidized to the extent of £1,500 a year by the German 
government, its workers and much of the rest of its income, which 
in all amounts to about £5,000 a year, come from all parts of the 
world. The University of Cambridge maintains a table for one of 
its students, as does also the British Association. America has al- 
ways one or two investigators working under Dr. Dohrn, while various 
European countries have their representatives. Not only has the 
Naples station its tanks and its laboratories, but it maintains steam 
launches and boats of various kinds, diving apparatus for investi- 
gating the sea bottom, dredges and trawlers, sailors and fishermen 
trained as collectors, and issues regularly a series of handsome 
Transactions, comparable to the publications-of our “ Challenger ” 
expedition. The advances made in the special department of 
Biology connected with fishes since the establishment of 
the Naples station has been immense, and has had besides im- 
portant bearings on other departments of the same branch of 
science. In this country no regular station of the kind has existed 
until within the last few months, when, under the auspices of the 
Scottish Meteorological Society, one has been established in an 
old quarry at Granton on the Firth of Forth, near Edinburgh. 
Already the naturalists at Granton have done good work in 
investigating the habits of the economical fishes, and especially 
the herring, and some of the results of their work were described 
to the Royal Society last Thursday by Professor Cossar Ewart, of 
Edinburgh. For several years the British Association has had a 
