l8 AMKKICAN FISHERIES SOCIETY. 



Tlie ship is admirably planned and constructed. The captain's 

 cabin occupies most of the after part of the deck, is spacious 

 and well furnished with everything necessary for the com- 

 mander's comfort. This cabin contains two staterooms, and is 

 lighted during the day by port holes on the side and a skylight 

 above on the poop deck. The oflficers' ward room is below this, 

 having seven spacious staterooms, a bathroom, and other con- 

 veniences not generally found on steamships. The ship is 

 lighted throughout with the incandescent electric light, which 

 not only makes the wardroom particularly cheerful in the even- 

 ing, but also illuminates the entire deck, so that at night the 

 vessel, as seen from the shore, looks like a brilliantly lighted 

 ball-room. 



Another thing rendered possible by the presence of the electric 

 light is surface collecting at night. Mr. G. W. Baird, chief en- 

 gineer of the ship, is the inventor of a cable to which he attaches 

 a screen-covered electric light. This, when the vessel is at an- 

 chor, can be lowered into the water just below the surface, and 

 the numerous young fish, marine worms, squids and shrimp, 

 attracted by the brightness of the light, are captured by means 

 of a hand net and transferred to the laboratory table for exami- 

 nation. This laboratory is amidships. There are really two 

 laboratories, an upper and lower; the first furnished with work- 

 ing tables, a sink, a library of books for reference, a microscope 

 and convenient tanks of alcohol; the second, called the "lower 

 laboratory," is below this, has benches for chemical work, and 

 opportunities for general carpentr}^ and work connected with 

 the collections. Here guns are cleaned and mended, and here 

 too are tiers of drawers in which specimens are stored. Be- 

 neath these drawers are large metal tanks filled with alcohol, 

 for containing the larger fish and specimens whose size prevents 

 them from being stored in the small glass jars. Below this 

 second laboratory, in the hold of the vessel, is still a third store- 

 room, of much the same nature, and used for much the same 

 purposes as the one above it. 



The apparatus for deep sea sounding, which is placed on the 

 port bow, consists of an easily running wheel supported in a 

 frame. Over this wheel runs a steel piano wire from a cylinder 



