April 1 6, 1885] 



NATURE 



557 



almost all the chief food fishes, except the herring group, 

 float at or near the surface of the water — so that they are 

 carried hither and thither by every surge of the tide, or 

 more steadily borne by the deeper currents to stock anew 

 exhausted waters. The minute and imperfectly-developed 

 embryos and the delicate young, moreover, are conveyed 

 into regions best suited for their future growth and well- 

 being. Further, we cannot but be impressed by the fitness 

 of the arrangement which ordains that these young fishes 

 are placed from the first amidst a rich surface-fauna of 

 minute forms which serve them as food. These range from 

 the microscopic Infusoria, which cause the crest of every 

 ripple at the ship's side to sparkle with light and the 

 tow-nets to gleam like tunnels of fire ; the wonderful 

 Plutei, or painter's easel-like larva? of star-fishes, swarms 

 of larval sea-acorns, Copepods, and the beautiful zoeas of 

 the higher crustaceans. Besides these, are the peculiar 

 Appendiculariae and Sagittae, and countless myriads of 

 larval mussels, which in summer crowd the surface of St. 

 Andrew's Bay, and at a still later stage, as they are for- 

 saking their pelagic existence to settle on the stones and 

 seaweeds, form the food of the more advanced young 

 cod, haddock, whiting, coal-fish, pollacV, and others that 

 seek shelter for a time amidst the shaggy belt of tangles 

 encircling the rocks. The latter thus in their larval state, 

 by nourishing in their profusion the delicate young of the 

 food fishes, in a sense repay the wise conservancy bestowed 

 by the Town Council of this city on the fine mussel- 

 beds of the Eden. It will, moreover, be observed that 

 it is not only the eggs of the higher marine animals which 

 float, but that for a long time zoologists have been familiar 

 with the pelagic eggs and young of many invertebrate 

 groups of importance. How else, indeed, could the 

 ubiquitous mussels, the sedentary oysters, and the equally 

 stationary sea-acorns and barnacles be spread throughout 

 the ocean ? Moreover, not only do these swimming larval 

 forms nourish the very young food-fishes around them, 

 either directly or indirectly, but as they — for instance, the 

 young crabs, lobsters, star-fishes, and mussels — grow larger 

 and older, a kind of rain, so to speak, of such forms 

 takes place from the surface to the bottom, which is 

 readily taken advantage of by the larger fishes, and thus 

 the wonderful cycle is completed. 



Finally, I need not point out to you the importance of the 

 Marine Laboratory, to which I have already alluded, and 

 at which the foregoing and other investigations were made 

 during the summer. We have facilities in this and in the 

 Practical Class, which are unusually favourable for study 

 and research, but at the same time our responsibilities 

 are not diminished by such advantages. We must all 

 render an account of our stewardship. When I mention 

 that many facts have yet to be determined in regard to 

 our common food-fishes — their development, rate of 

 growth, their life-histories and migrations — that we have 

 much to find out as to the best methods of increasing 

 such valuable fishes as the cod, the haddock, the sole, and 

 turbot, and of maintaining that increase, it will be ap- 

 parent that such problems are not only of moment to us 

 but to the country, and that we cannot begin too soon to 

 attempt their solution, as well as to increase our know- 

 ledge in regard to manv of the lower forms of animal 

 life. 



THE NEW UNIVERSITY OF STRASBURG 

 "THE following account of the new university buildings 

 *■ of Strasburg is taken, with a few abbreviations, from 

 an article contributed to our contemporary La Nature, 

 by M. Charles Grad, who is himself a deputy to the 

 Imperial Reichsrath from Alsace. 



On Monday, October 27th, 1SS4, the new buildings of 

 the University of Strasburg were opened with due for- 

 malities. These buildings form an entire quarter of the 

 city, and constitute a magnificent series of palaces for the 



prosecution of science. No city in Europe, not even 

 excepting the great capitals, can show such a rich pro- 

 vision for higher education, or one in which the various 

 parts are so admirably combined. Every branch of study 

 has its own proper and distinct location allotted to it, 

 with laboratories, museums, library, and special appli- 

 ances. It has been done on the large scale, and most 

 successfully. The Imperial Government and the represen- 

 tatives of the Alsatian population arrived at an under- 

 standing, and vied in their efforts to endow the province 

 of Alsace-Lorraine with a school of learning unrivalled in 

 its arrangements and in its wealth of buildings. Even 

 those who were most severely touched by the annexation 

 to Germany, agree that in raising this splendid monument 

 —the new University of Strasburg — the one wish has 

 been to serve the interests of science apart from all 

 sinister or narrow national considerations. 



The former Academie of Strasburg, broken up in 1870 

 by the war, was replaced by the new University by virtue 

 of a decree issued from the Chancelry of the German 

 Empire, under date of December nth, 1871 — the same day 

 on weich the additional convention of the treaty of peace 

 was signed at Frankfort. This decree entrusted the 

 organisation of the teaching staff to M. von Roggenbach, 

 formerly Minister of the Grand Duchy of Baden. From 



LSTis'saafttSTf yJMa 



li 



sity of 



The Collegiate Palace. 



the summer semester of 1872 onwards a body of forty- 

 two professors constituted the staff. They began their 

 work on May 1st of that year, being the three hundred 

 and fifth anniversary of the opening of the Academie, 

 which was founded May 1st, 1567, by the Stattmeister 

 Johann Sturm von Sturmeck. At the present time the 

 new L T niversity of Strasburg counts seventy-three ordinary 

 and nineteen extraordinary professors, who during the 

 summer semester of the year 1884, have conducted in the 

 five faculties no fewer than 242 courses of lectures and 

 classes. The work is thus distributed between the five 

 faculties : 



Classes 

 Fac Ity. Professors. and Lectures. 



Theology 7 



Law and Political ) 

 Sciences . . ) 



Medicine 26 



Philosophy 25 



Natural Sciences ) 

 & Mathematics ( ' 



Side by side with the laboratories and hospitals 

 attached to each special branch of the natural and medical 

 sciences, there exist the seminaries appropriate to the 

 other branches of learning duly equipped for the purpose 

 of initiating the student into the real work of his subject. 

 A fine library of 560,000 volumes, and a reading-room 

 furnished with 571 periodicals, reviews, and journals, are 

 fitted up in the ancient episcopal residence or chateau, for 

 the use of both pupils and masters. At the beginning of 



26 

 29 



60 

 77 

 5° 



