INTRODUCTION xiu 



the microscopic tenants of a rock-pool as among the 

 larger animals of a more obvious world ; and so forth. 

 But we are unable to isolate mentally a single species, 

 and to describe how it reacts to the incessant changes 

 of its physical and organic environment. 



Between these extremes of scale between the 

 gigantic and world-embracing movements of Air and 

 Water, and the brief life of the minutest organism 

 He, intricately interwoven, the problems with which the 

 student of oceanography must wrestle. But while his 

 proper work is the orderly marshalling of facts into 

 groups, as a basis for explanations or at least for 

 hypotheses the facts themselves can be gathered in 

 quantity by any traveller who chooses to take the 

 trouble of doing so. 



