August 28, 1903.] 



SCIENCE. 



267 



spent, not in the study of marine types, 

 but in the elaboration of my collections 

 made in Oliio and for which my own labo- 

 ratory furnishes the necessary equipment 

 better than those to which I have made 

 my annual migi-ations. Nevertheless, I 

 have always felt that the time and money 

 so spent were profitably invested— indeed 

 the expenditure has actually been neces- 

 sary to the highest efficiency of the re- 

 search. 



The apparent paradox is fully explained 

 when it is remembered that the man can 

 put into the research no more than he has 

 in himself. The investigation is no ex- 

 ternal thing which he makes; it is his life, 

 and the man must first be broadened, deep- 

 ened and rounded out, if this manifesta- 

 tion of his inner life is to have real power, 

 is to become an efficient factor in the 

 world 's work. This the summer laboratory 

 can do, and can do with small material 

 outlay, if only we go at the thing in the 

 proper way. 



Most of us are closely shut up during 

 the nine months of the school year in the 

 confined atmosphere of our own labora- 

 tories, often in almost total isolation from 

 our confreres with whom we are (or should 

 be) collaborating in the prosecution of 

 our researches. " In such a case one nat- 

 urally slip into ruts, and sooner or later, 

 unless the situation is relieved, his work 

 will give evidence of a mildew, or per- 

 chance a dry rot will permeate his best 

 work, so that freshness, originality and 

 virility gradually give place to dreary 

 routine or to grotesque fantasy. 



That this is not the inevitable outcome 

 of the sort of solitary confinement to which 

 many investigators, particularly those in 

 the smaller colleges, are of necessity con- 

 demned is clear from the history of many 

 of our most illustrious reseai'ch workers 

 whose most valuable contributions have 



been produced under just these conditions. 

 But the fact remains, that just in propor- 

 tion as our work will prove of real and 

 permanent value, we must keep ourselves 

 in touch by some means or other with the 

 outer world, with the current tendencies 

 and advance movements of research in 

 cognate lines. This can of course be done 

 in great measure through the medium of 

 the press, but nothing can take the place 

 of real, vital contact with other investiga- 

 tors in the fiesh. Here we get not only 

 inspiration and stimulus in general, but 

 often items of direct value to our own work 

 j-ears in advance of their publication. 



The summer laboratory should be a 

 clearing-house of scientific ideas, not mere- 

 ly a hotbed or forcing house for budding 

 researches. To meet this need it is evi- 

 dent that the greater the diversity in per- 

 sonnel and range of interests represented 

 the better. That which the university 

 student prizes most is the intimate daily 

 contact in the lecture room and laboratory 

 with his instructors. In the properly or- 

 ganized summer biological station every 

 worker comes into that same sort of rela- 

 tion with every other worker, and this, I 

 take it, is the best that the station can offer 

 to its patrons. To attain the highest effi- 

 ciency there must, therefore, be sufficient 

 flexibility of organization and diversity of 

 interests represented to correct the tend- 

 encies toward intellectual in-breeding 

 which we find in most of our university 

 and college laboratories and to secure a 

 sort of cross-fertilization of scientific or- 

 ganizations. 



Regardless of the individual investiga- 

 tor's problem and method, he can well 

 afford to utilize such opportvmities ; indeed 

 he can not afford, except in imusual cases, 

 to neglect them for long periods, if he 

 would retain his intellectual tone and 

 elasticitv. The station, is short, is an 



