;2o 



NATURE 



[February 5, 190^ 



A ROMANCE OF THE DEEP SEA. 1 



TO those of our readers who have followed our succes- 

 sive notices of the great work achieved by Dr. 

 Alcock in the exploration of the Indian Seas, for which 



Fig. 1. — Chlaenopagitrus .-!//.' 



1 its protective blanket of sea anemones. 



(From Alcoek's " Naturalist in the Indian Seas.") 



lie has just been granted a Coronation honour, the 

 present book, dedicated by the author to his shipmates, 

 will be welcome : while to the general public it ought to 

 be both interesting and instructive, if only by the nature 

 of its contents and its literary style. It is 

 divided into three parts ; the first, of fourteen 

 chapters, giving a popular account of the ship 

 and the voyage, and of apparatus and methods 

 employed ; the second, of nine chapters, giving 

 a popular account of the deep-sea fauna of the 

 Indian region ; the third, in the form of appen- 

 dices, being a list of dredging stations and 

 depths, and a complete record of the literature 

 of the expedition as thus far published. The 

 Andaman and Arabian Seas, and the Bay of 

 Bengal, were the scene of action ; and, in the 

 intervals of dredging and surveying, land 

 parties were daily put ashore to sound and 

 erect survey marks, and were in some cases 

 left there for a month at a time for tide-watching, 

 shore-collecting and other congenial occu- 

 pations. Among the islands visited were the 

 Andamans (twice), the Laccadives and the Coco set. 

 Cardamum and Minfiikoy a special chapter is given. 



1 " A Naturalist in the Indian Seas ; or, Four Years with the Royal In- 

 dian Marine Survey Ship Investigator." By A. Alcock, M.B., LL.D., 

 F.R.S. Pp. xxiv 4- 318 ; 0,8 figs., tables and amap. (London : J. Murray, 



NO. I736, VOL. 67] 



The author pays a just tribute to the pioneer work of 



Davis and Baffin, to Drake, as the discoverer of the 



" Robber crab," and to the early labours of the Bombay 



Marine in 1832 and of the Marine Survey of India in 



1874, which, under the stimulus arising 



out of the Challenger expedition, led to 



the adoption of modern standards and 



the now memorable series of voyages 



which will ever be associated with the 



author's name. 



The earlier portion of the book, in- 

 tentionally popular, is charming in its 

 method. A walk across the bed of the 

 ocean from Madras to the Andamans is 

 idealised in a manner calculated to 

 fascinate the reader and arouse an 

 interest in marine research. The 

 Globigerina ooze, depth and darkness, 

 the essentials of coral reef structure and 

 formation, and other allied topics, are 

 graphically introduced, in terms as far as 

 possible expressive of the author's first 

 impressions and his enthusiasm thereby 

 aroused. 



Adaptation to life in deep water and 

 colour variation and resemblance come 

 conspicuously into consideration ; and 

 interesting to a degree are the descrip- 

 tions of a series of hermit crabs, some so 

 little modified as to remain lobster like 

 in appearance, but still given to the 

 characteristic hiding habit. One of these 

 creatures, from the Andamans at 185 

 fathoms, "bottles" itself in a piece of 

 mangrove stem or a bamboo internode, 

 filling it tightly, with its great claws so 

 extended that their terminal joints, flexed, 

 close the mouth of the tube as by a lid. 

 Another (Chkxnopagurus) from the Mala- 

 bar coast effects the early attachment to 

 its body of a compound anemone, which, 

 extending with the growth of its host, 

 forms a fleshy pallium bearing two lateral 

 series of polyps. Holding the edge of 

 this with its smaller pincers, the crab 

 not only keeps it in place, but is en- 

 abled, as Dr. A. R. S. Anderson (who in 

 the later days of the I/ivcstiga/or work dredged these 

 two remarkable animals) has observed, to pull the 

 pallium forwards the more completely to effect a covering 

 for its head. 



^ 



Fig. 2. 



Minowi biennis, with commensal polyps (Stjrlactis minei). 

 (From Alcoek's " Naturalist in the Indian Seas.") 



To 



The work teems with charming topics of this order. 

 Croaking crabs, milk-giving rays, luminous fishes and 

 crustaceans are described, the latter as discharging a 

 renal (green-gland) and para-oviducal secretion, and a 

 sea-urchin has been observed which carried rice to its 

 burrow for storage. Among the deep-sea fishes, of 



