38 THE NAUTILUS. 



ward's Manual of Conehology, and one that brings the matter down 

 to date will soon appear in a forthcoming paper by Dr. Dall on 

 collecting. We threw overboard our dredge in the warm bright 

 waters of Tampa Bay as the boat was brought up into the wind, and 

 awaited results. There is a certain kiud of excitement about the 

 operation ; the jar and tremble of the rope as the implement — far 

 down out of sight — scrapes over the bottom, gathering in the treasures 

 of the deep, produces a sensation akin to that which an angler feels 

 when he gets a bite, or a sportsman when he sights game and 

 " draws a bead." And this feeling reaches a fever heat when the 

 dredge is hoisted slowly, leaving a cloudy wake in the water, and its 

 contents are dumped into the screen. 



Starfishes, echini, perhaps a big horseshoe crab or two, and, 

 mingled with living mollusks and fishes there may probably be dead 

 shells inhabited by various forms of hermit crabs, fish, sea-worms 

 and a dozen other kinds of life, many of which may be puzzling 

 even to an experienced naturalist. There is something wonderful 

 about all this, and entirely different from shore collecting ; the 

 animals are taken in their homes, caught in the very act of carry- 

 ing on their ordinary avocations, and it is not to be wondered at 

 that they seem to have a kind of surprised appearance when they 

 are tumbled out indiscriminately on deck. There is always an 

 element of uncertainty about dredging that furnishes a mild excite- 

 ment akin to that of gambling. One throw, or a half dozen in 

 succession, may turn out to be " water hauls," bringing up nothing 

 but mud or possibly sea urchins, and the "just once more before we 

 go away " may bring up half a hundred species, some of them rare, 

 and all desirable. 



The vicinity of Tampa Bay is rich in marine species and is classic 

 ground to the conchologist and the collector, it having been worked 

 over by Agassiz, Conrad, Stimpson, Spinner, and other noted men 

 who have passed on, and Drs. Stearns and Dall, Yelie, Calkins, and 

 others who are still with us ; and often a run along the shores of 

 some of the outer keys, or about the muddy, sandy bays, will reveal 

 shells enough to turn the head of even a steady-going experienced 

 conchologist. And at such times it always happens that when the 

 collector gets every bucket, and sack, and basket, and both bands 

 loaded down to the last limit with things that are good enough in 

 all conscience, and is miles away from his boat, he begins to run 

 upon numbers of such marvelously rare and beautiful things that 



