February 28, 1913] 



SCIENCE 



327 



merce and Labor and by the Bureau of Fisheries 

 of that department has been in accordance with 

 the law; that the regulations issued from time to 

 time by the department and the instructions issued 

 to the agents have been properly observed; that 

 the fur-seal herd has been handled intelligently; 

 and that the charges have not been sustained. 



The charges of malfeasance brought with 

 such a flourish against the Department of 

 Commerce and Labor by Mr. Henry W. El- 

 liott, with the support of Dr. William T. 

 Hornaday and a very small minority of the 

 Camp Fire Club, whom the majority report 

 characterizes as " public spirited citizens," 

 have proved a fiasco. It is said that they in- 

 fluenced the action of congress in suspending 

 land sealing. We can well believe this. The 

 aforesaid congressional action provides for the 

 throwing away of $2,500,000 worth of seal- 

 skins, jeopardizes the permanence of a benefi- 

 cent treaty which is essential to the only sal- 

 vation of the herd, and inflicts upon the rook- 

 eries a horde of idle fighting bulls to work de- 

 struction among the breeding females and 

 their young. There is a close resemblance be- 

 tween this ill-advised action of congress and 

 the equally unwarranted investigation, as dis- 

 closed in the dual report of the committee 

 conducting it. 



If congress had wished to enact a law for 

 the encouragement of pelagic sealing it could 

 scarcely have done so more effectively than it 

 did when it prohibited commercial killing on 

 the land of the surplus male seals. 



George Archibald Clark 



Stanford University, Cal., 

 February 11, 1913 



THE ALPJNJE LABOBATOUT 

 The Alpine Laboratory is situated at 8,500 

 feet on the Cog Railway between Manitou and 

 the summit of Pikes Peak. The flora is both 

 rich and varied, and in connection with the 

 remarkable diversity of habitat found in this 

 rugged mountain region offers exceptional op- 

 portunities for the study of plant response, 

 and the origin of new forms. Among the 

 alpine summits of the continent, Pikes Peak 

 is unique in the series of great formational 



zones which lies across its face. From the 

 Great Plains grasslands, the series runs from 

 valley woodland at 5,800 feet to mesa, chapar- 

 ral, foothill woodland, pine forest, aspen wood- 

 land and spruce forest to alpine meadow, rock 

 field and bog at 11,000-14,000 feet in a dis- 

 tance of 7 miles. From the very nature of 

 the mountains, weathering, erosion and other 

 physiographic factors bring about the almost 

 countless repetition of the same or similar 

 habitats, and produce numbers of primary and 

 secondary successions illustrating a wide range 

 of developmental processes and principles. 



Ecological work was first done at Pikes 

 Peak in 1899, and has been carried on each 

 summer since that time. In consequence, it is 

 probable that no other area has been so inten- 

 sively studied by means of instrument and 

 quadrat, and offers such a fascinating array 

 of ecological problems for which the founda- 

 tion has at least been sketched. The scope and 

 nature of this foundation work is indicated 

 by the following publications : " Development 

 and Structure of Vegetation, 1904 " ; " Re- 

 search Methods in Ecology, 1905 " ; " Rela- 

 tion of Leaf Structure to Physical Factors, 

 1905 " ; " Vegetation of the Mesa Region, 

 1906 " ; " Life History of the Lodgepole Bum 

 Forests, 1909"; "Natural Vegetation as an 

 Indicator, 1910"; "Wilting Coefficient, 1911," 

 and " Development and Structure of Sand- 

 hill Vegetation, 1913." 



The practical aspects of quantitative ecol- 

 ogy are represented by the Fremont Forest 

 Experiment Station, and the Dry-land Agri- 

 culture Field Station of the U. S. Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture, perhaps the best 

 equipped stations in the world for the exact 

 study of vegetational problems. 



The field of investigation open falls into 

 four general divisions : (1) the use of quanti- 

 tative methods of studying habitat and 

 plant; (2) the application of ecological meth- 

 ods and principles to forestry, agriculture 

 and plant pathology; (3) the measured study 

 of individual response to the habitat with 

 especial reference to the origin of species; 

 (4) quadrat study of the development and 

 structure of plant formations. The oppor- 



