878 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES [6] 



impossible to estimate exactly the changes of position caused by cur- 

 rents, etc., especially when out of sight of land, and in a few cases the 

 positions were not placed on the charts at the time, and the bearings 

 given do not suffice to fix them very accurately. It is believed, how- 

 ever, that but few posilions are rendered uncertain to any great extent 

 by either of these causes. A large part of the positions determined by 

 the Baclic were originally given by latitude and longitude. The other 

 latitudes and longitudes given in the tables are intended to serve as 

 the readiest means of finding the localities, all of which are either thus 

 designated or are referred to as being near others which are so. The 

 bearings given for the Speedwell's work in 1878 are true; the others, 

 with a few (unrecognizable) exceptions, are magnetic. 



In the last column of the tables the letter indicates the apparatus em- 

 ployed in dredging : D., Dredge ; Ag. D., Agassiz Dredge ; R. D., Rake 

 Dredge; T., Trawl; Ag. T., Agassiz Trawl; O. T., Otter Trawl; Tan., 

 Tangles. 



STATIONS FOR 1871, IN AND ABOUT VINEYARD SOUND, MASSACHUSETTS. 



During this, the first year of the Commission, the dredgings in shal- 

 low water were made partly from a sail-boat and partly from a steam- 

 launch, and those in the deeper waters from the United States revenue- 

 cutter Moccasin, Capt. J. Gr. Baker. The dredging stations numbered 

 in all about 250, but to avoid confusion in laying them out on the chart, 

 they were combined into 87 groups or lines, each including from 2 to 9 

 stations, the lines being designated by numbers, the stations by letters. 

 In this manner they were represented on the large chart accompanying 

 the Report of the United States Fish Commissioner for 1871-72. In 

 making up the present list the same arrangement has also been followed, 

 and where all the stations of a group were of the same nature, they 

 have been located collectively ; otherwise the exact position of each sta- 

 tion has been given. 



Dates are not prefixed to all of the inner groups, as many of these 

 include stations made on different days. Temperature observations 

 (with Miller-Casella self-registering thermometers) were taken at most 

 of the outer stations, as recorded in the list, but were omitted at the 

 inner ones. The dredge was the implement most commonly used for 

 scraping the bottom, but the beam trawl was also frequently em- 

 ployed on the smooth inner grounds. The rake-dredge was worked a 

 few times off Gay Head and the tangles very rarely, in only a few 

 places. The characters of the many localities.gone over in 1871, as well 

 as the species of animals found inhabiting them, are fully discussed in 

 the "Report upon the Invertebrate Animals of Vineyard Sound and 

 the adjacent waters, with an account of the physical characters of the 

 region," by Prof. A. E. Verrill; contained in the Report of the United 

 States Fish Commissioner, Part I, for 1871-'72. 



