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have placed at the disposal of the report, has also been very considerable. As the entire 

 material, so obtained, certainly exceeded all expectations, it is not astonishing that its 

 elaboration has required more time than was originally anticipated. 



The present Report of the Committee has been worked out on the basis of all the 

 investigations of the international cooperation hitherto dealing with this subject. The 

 results of these investigations have been expressed partly in papers already published, 

 partly in the form of material which has been placed at the disposal of the Committee 

 by the various members for the purpose of this summary. So far as this material had 

 not received detailed elaboration it was worked out at the request of the Committee by 

 B. Helland-Hansen, Knut Dahl and D. Damas, and united by them into single large 

 reports along with the already published investigations. These reports have been appended 

 to this report as special papers. For these as for the special reports also included here 

 which have been sent in directly by Prof D'Arcy Thompson, Dr. Redeke, Dr. Johs. 

 Schmidt and Dr. Eorley the authors themselves assume the responsibility. 



As the result of this, the Committee in preparing their report have based their state- 

 ments chiefly on the special papers mentioned below, and must refer to them for the 

 exact evidence. In consequence, the more detailed portions are also included in these 

 special papers and removed from the general summary of the Committee. It lies in the 

 nature of the case, that the present report could not presume to be the reproduction of 

 all the observations and facts placed at the disposal of the Committee. In the first place, 

 it seems to us, that the work of the Committee is not finished with the publication of 

 this report and in the second place, the report is of value just because it is limited to 

 the certain and greatest results yet attained, whether in regard to the mere methods or 

 to knowledge of the biology of the fishes or the fisheries themselves. This does not 

 interfere with the fact, however, that the material collected has been on the whole of great 

 importance for the planning and shaping of the work, as well as for the control of the 

 data which have been used as evidence in this report. 



Even with this limitation it may be said of the present report that it embraces just 

 what was originally intended, since it throws light on just the three great questions, 

 which were expressed in the programme of work drawn up at the first, preparatory 

 meeting of the Committee at Edinburgh in the year 1902, namely: 



1. the distribution of the plankton eggs as a method of describing the occurrence 

 of the spawning cod, 



2. the passive movements of these eggs during their development to larvae and 

 young fishes, 



3. the fluctuating occurrence of the older stages, illustrated by statistics. 



The Report contains the following sections: 

 I. The first section gives a brief review of the geographical and hydrographical 

 conditions in the region investigated, yet only with regard to the conditions which 



