224 ‘Miscellaneous. 
I may here be permitted to express to the officers of the ‘ Talisman ’ 
all the gratitude with which their courtesy has inspired us. They 
interested themselves in our work with an ardour which never 
flagged, and if we have completely succeeded in our mission it is to 
them that we owe our success. 
On the 30th of May the scientific commission met at Rochefort *, 
and on June Ist the ‘ Talisman’ quitted port. 
The expedition of 1883 may be subdivided into several distinct 
sections :—we had in the first place as our object to study the coast 
of Africa as far as the Senegal; then to explore the neighbourhood 
of the Cape-Verd Islands, the Canaries, and the Azores, volcanic 
lands which could not fail to furnish us with some interesting facts ; 
lastly, we hoped to pay some attention to:the Sargasso Sea, from the 
point of view of its fauna and the nature of its bed. 
The depths which extend to the west of Morocco and the Sahara 
are of yery great regularity ; one no longer finds there that dis- 
turbed relief which, on the coasts of Spain, had rendered our opera- 
tions so difficult. On the contrary, the slope is gradual, and by 
travelling further from or nearer to the land one can find, almost 
certainly, the depth that one expected. On these bottoms we 
used the dredge about 120 times, and at the end of some days we 
knew the bathymetric distribution of the animals of this region well 
enough to be able to indicate from the contents of our nets what 
had been the depth explored. 
At 500 or 600 metres live numerous fishes, such as Macrurus, 
Malacocephalus, Hoplostethus, and Pleuronectes, as well as some 
shrimps of the genus Pandalus and of a new species with a rostrum 
pointed like a sword, species of Peneus and Pasiphaé, some small 
crabs (Oxyrhynchi, Portunidee, and Ebalids), some rose-coloured 
Holothurians, some rare specimens of Calveria, that soft sea-urchin 
discovered in our seas by the naturalists of the ‘ Porcupine,’ and 
known previously in the fossil state, and many sponges of great 
size, such as Askonema and Lurrea. 
At a greater depth, about 1000 or 1500 metres, fishes abound f. 
Often they constituted the greater part of our booty. Their colours 
are, in general, dull, their flesh is gelatinous, their skin is indued 
with a thick coat of mucus; many bear phosphorescent plates, 
intended to light them in the darkness where they live. 
The Pandali have given place to the new genus Heterocarpus, 
Peneide in which the last two pairs of legs are long and articulated 
like antenne ; and to enormous shrimps of a blood-red colour and 
* The commission was composed of M. A. Milne-Edwards, of the 
Institute, president, of MM. de Folin, Vaillant, Perrier, Marion, Filhol, 
and Fischer, to whom had been added, as assistants, MM. Brongniart and 
Poirault. Detained at the last moment by his university duties, M. 
Marion was unable to embark. 
+ There are still Macruri, to which are to be added the following 
genera :—Bathynectes, Coryphenotdes, Malacocephalus, Bathygadus, Argy- 
ropelecus, Chauhodus, Bathypterois, Stomias, Malacosteus, Alepocephalus. 
ee 
