1887.] PROF. BELL ON THE BRITISH MARINE AREA. .'JGI 



we have received advance copies of the Report of the British 

 Association Committee, " appointed for the purpose of considering 

 the question of accurately defining the term ' British,' as applied to 

 the Marine Fauna and Flora of our Islands." To us it is a question 

 of especial interest, feeling as we do that our best efforts ought to 

 be directed to the care and maintenance of one of the most instructive 

 and one of the most popular of the Galleries in the British Museum 

 of Natural History — the one which is ordinarily known as the British 

 Room. 



When we ask ourselves what that room should contain, we have 

 to answer — the products of the British Seas ; and when we go 

 further and ask, What are the British Seas ? there is only one answer 

 that can be given us — the waters that wash the British coasts as far 

 as three miles from land. This is, all the world knows, an arbitrary 

 or conventional arrangement. 



If, on the other hand, we seek for the natural boundaries of the 

 British Marine Area, we are met by the facts that it merges on the 

 south into that of the coasts of France, and on the north into those 

 of Norway ; the only species that can be considered in any way 

 peculiar to it are little-known forms from great depths, such as 

 Amphiura bellis, var. tritonis, of Hoyle. Indeed, in the classical 

 work of Edward Forbes \ the Shetland Islands form part of his 

 Boreal Province, and the rest of the British Isles constitute the 

 northern portion of the Celtic Province, whose southern boundary 

 is the Bay of Biscay. 



We are therefore forced to conclude that there is no such thing 

 as a British Marine Area ; this is not to be taken as implying that 

 we think that the British Association Committee were engaged on a 

 task which was a mere waste of time, but only to give force to the 

 way in which we should wish to approach the question. 



Without seeking for limitations, we ask what may we put in the 

 "British Room," or whence may collectors who confine their 

 collections to British specimens get their examples ? 



If we are to bind ourselves by the rules of the Committee, we 

 must omit specimens taken from the Channel Islands : this we 

 cannot but think is a regrettable decision ; the community of the 

 fauna on either bank of the English Channel is very well marked, 

 but, as a rule, the specimens which come from the southern side are 

 so much finer, and the opportunities for collecting them are generally 

 so much more advantageous that (bearing always in mind that we 

 have to do with an artificially restricted area) we should be reluctant 

 to lose our best hunting-ground. We may, we think, claim that 

 Dr. Gwyn Jeffreys would have been of this opinion -. 



Our view, then, as to the limits of the area are best expressed in 

 the following terms : we would apply the principle of using political 

 divisions ciimgrano sa/«s— including, that is. the Channel Islands, the 

 Shetlands, and St. Kilda, but omitting Heligoland. 



It may be pointed out that a strict hiterpretation of the rules pro- 



' ' Natural History of the European Seas.' 

 2 See his ' British Conchology,' i. p. cxi. 



