REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. CXXXI 



The collections were assorted partly in Washington and partly in 

 Cambridge, and during the past year the different groups have been 

 distributed for study among a number of specialists who were selected 

 with reference to their previous acq^^aintance with the subjects assigned 

 them, several having i)articipated in the working up of the collections 

 obtained during the famous cruise of H. M. S. Challenger. Their 

 reports, when they shall have been completed and published, will 

 undoubtedly coustitute one of the most important series of contribu- 

 tions ever issued respecting the biology of the deep sea. 



The assignments made have been as follows: 



The birds, to Mr. Robert Ridgway, U. S. National Museum ; reptiles, 

 to Mr. Leonhard Stejneger, U. S. N^ational Museum; fishes, to Mr. 

 Samuel Garman, Museum of Comparative Zoology; phosphorescent 

 organs of fishes, to Dr. E. von Lendenfeld, Innsbruck, Austria; cephalo- 

 pods, to Prof. William E. Hoyle, Owens College, Manchester, England ; 

 gastropod, lamellibranch, and scaphopod molliisks, to Mr. William H. 

 Dall, TJ. S, National Museum ; nudibranch mollusks, to Dr. E. Bergh, 

 Copenhagen, Denmark; pteropodsand heteropods, to Dr. P.Schiemenz, 

 Zoological Station, Naples, Italy; ascidiaus, to Prof. W. A. Herdman, 

 Liverpool, England; salpidoe and doliolidfe, to M. P. A. Traiitstedt, Den- 

 mark ; bryozoans, to C. B. Davenport, Museum of Comparative Zoology ; 

 land insects, to Prof. C. V. Riley, Washington, D. C; halobatidse, 

 a group of pelagic insects, to Mr. E. P. van Duzee, Buffalo, N. Y.; 

 pycnogonids, to W. Schimkewitch, St. Petersburg, Russia; crustaceans, 

 to Prof. Walter Faxon, Museum of Comparative Zoology; ostracods, 

 to Dr. G. W. Miiller, Greifswald, Germany; annelids, to Mr. James E. 

 Benedict, U. S. National Museum; sipunciiloid worms, to Mr. H. B. 

 Ward, Troy, N. Y.; sagittte, to Dr. K, Brandt, Kiel, Germany; plana- 

 rians, to Mr. W. McM. Wood worth, Museum of Comparative Zoology; 

 holothurians, to Prof. Herbert Ludwig, Bonn am Rhein, Prussia; echini, 

 to Mr. Alexander Agassiz ; starfishes, to Mr. W. Percy Sladen, London, 

 England; ophiurans, to Prof. C. F. Liitken, Copenhagen, Denmark; 

 comatulse to Dr. C. Hartlaub, Gottingen, Germany; stalked crinoids, 

 to Mr. Agassiz; antipathes, to Mr. George Brook, Edinburgh, Scotland; 

 alcyouarians, to Prof. Theodor Studer, Berne, Switzerland; actinarians, 

 to Prof. E. L. Mark, Museum of Comparative Zoology; actinian and 

 hydroid corals, to Dr. G. von Koch, Darmstadt, Germany; hydroids, to 

 Prof. S. F. Clarke and Mr. F. B. Peabody, Williams College, Mass.; 

 acalephs and pelagic fauna generally, to Mr. Agassiz; siphonophores, 

 to Mr. C. Chun, Breslau, Germany; sponges, to Prof. H. V. Wilson, 

 University of North Carolina ; foraminifera, to Prof. A. Goes, Stockholm, 

 Sweden; thallasicohie, to Dr. K. Brandt, Kiel, Germany; nullipores, to 

 Prof. William Farlow, Harvard University; samples of ocean bottom, 

 to Mr. John Murray, Edinburgh, Scotland; geological specimens, to 

 Mr. George Merrill, U. S. National Museum. Mr. John Murray, who 

 directed the preparation of the scientific results of H. M. S. Challenger 

 after the death of Sir Wy ville Thomson, has also been fut-nished with 



