354 THE HISTOEY AND SCOPE OF ZOOLOGY IX 



practical end in view, viz. the study of food-fishes 

 with an aim to pisciculture. The demand for a 

 knowledge of the embryology of all classes of animals, 

 and for further facts as to the structure and life -history 

 of the minuter microscopic or very delicate forms of 

 marine life, is what has determined the multiplication 

 of these marine " stations." The largest and best sup- 

 ported pecuniarily is that founded at Naples by Anton 

 Dohrn in 1872; others exist at Trieste, Villefranche, 

 Cette, and at New Haven and Beaufort in the United 

 States, whilst a large laboratory, on a scale to compare 

 with that at Naples, has this year (1888) been opened 

 at Plymouth by the Marine Biological Association of 

 the United Kingdom. 



Another result of the stimulus given to zoological 

 research by Darwin's work is the undertaking of 

 voyages to distant lands by skilled anatomists for the 

 purpose of studying on the spot, and with all the 

 advantages of abundant and living material, the 

 structure, and especially the embryology, of rare and 

 exceptionally interesting forms of animal life. In the 

 pre-Darwinian period of this century zoologists who 

 were convinced of the importance of anatomical and 

 embryological study were still content to study speci- 

 mens immersed in spirit and brought home, often 

 imperfectly preserved, by unskilled collectors, or to 

 confine their attention to such species as could be 

 procured in Europe. Before Cuvier, as we have 

 already pointed out, attention was, with rare excep- 

 tions, limited to the dried skeletons and external 

 forms of animals. Now, however, the enterprising 



