292 THE FOEAMINIFEEA 



The net is made of coarse cloth to form a long 

 bag, with an iron hoop of 1 foot to 18 inches in 

 diameter at the mouth. On hoard the ' Challenger ' 

 these tow-nets were dragged either from the ship or 

 from small boats lowered for the purpose ; and by 

 this means the beautiful specimens of living Glohi- 

 gerinm and OrhulincE^ beset with their long and deli- 

 cate spines, were collected, figures of which are given 

 in the Keport on the Eesults, vol. ix. plates Ixxvii. 

 Ixxviii. 



Ordinary deep-sea dredges or beam trawls are 

 used at varying depths for collecting the oceanic 

 bottom deposits ; for a great many species of Forami- 



m»>n/-rltl!p<>t llimurrmr 



Fig. 37. — The Tow-net in Use (from ' Eep. on Deep-sea Deposits'). 



nifera habitually live on the ocean floor, where they 

 creep over the surface objects on the mud or sand ac- 

 cumulations, or attach themselves to the seaweeds, 

 stems of hydrozoa, or the long spicules of sponges, such 

 SisHyalonema. To make the dredge effective in bring- 

 ing up the fine oozy material, a piece of fine cloth is 

 tacked on to the inside of the dredge at the bottom. 



In shallow water, Foraminifera in the living con- 

 dition can be collected from seaweed, and the lami- 

 narian zone round the coasts of Britain furnishes us 

 with a good collecting ground. Mr. Halkyard describes 

 the method of procedure as follows : — 



