SCIENCE 



NEW TOEK, SEPTEMBER 8. 1893. 

 THE MARINE BIOLOGICAL LABORATORY. 



BY DAILAS L. SHAEP, BEIDGETON, N. J. 



The sixth summer session of the Marine Biological 

 Laboratory, at Wood's HoU, Mass., ended with August '93, 

 and a short review of the station, of its work and growth, 

 will be of interest to Science readers, throughout the 

 country, who are at all interested in our advancement in 

 biological thought and investigation. 



The phenomenal growth and spendid proportions of the 

 Marine Biological Laboratory, as it now stands, justly 

 deserve the interest and admiration of every educated 

 American. 



Starting six years ago, in 1888, the Laboratory was 

 but a single building of two large rooms, poorly equipped 

 for work, with only one boat for collecting material, and 

 a total of seventeen students. The session of '93 opened 

 with three connected buildings more than twice as large as 

 the original, containing thirty-four private rooms, a lecture 

 room, a library, a suj)ply department, five general labor- 

 atories, and a total of one hundred and twelve students. 

 Instead of a single row-boat, there are now several at the 

 Laboratory's wharf and beside these a splendid Burgess- 

 built steam launch perfectly equipped for collecting and 

 always at the students' command. 



The secret of this extraordinary growth is mainly due to 

 the Laboratory's ideal foundation, its location, its officers 

 and the high grade of its work. 



In 1881, at Annisquam, a quaint little fishing village on 

 Cape Ann, the Woman's Educational Society of Boston 

 started a small laboratory for the study of marine zoology 

 For six years investigation was carried on here, with 

 constantly increasing demands for better and more ac- 

 comodations, until the necessity of a permanent and 

 better equipped laboratory brought together a number 

 of Boston scientists, who were organized into a corporation 

 under the name of the Marine Biological Laboratory. 



Thus it came into existence, and though started in 

 Boston it is by no means a local institution. It can hard- 

 ly be called national, for students from Maine to California 

 work side by side with those from England, Germany and 

 Japan. Its board of trustees includes a large proportion of 

 America's most prominent scientists, and their aim is to 

 make the Laboratory an institution second to none of its 

 kind in the world. 



The location of the Laboratory at Wood's Holl is most 

 happy. It was not the result of luck or chance. Over 

 twenty years ago the late Professor Spencer P. Baird, of 

 the Smithsonian Institution, recognized the advantages of 

 Wood's Holl for the study of marine life, and for many years 

 he and his assistants came here and worked through the 

 summer months. As a result of his work, the United 

 States has established here her most important fishing 

 station, whose buildings are the finest of their kind in the 

 world. Nowhere along the Atlantic coast do the Amer- 

 ican waters offer more varied or richer fields for the 

 naturalist. 



Looking off to the southward from a Laboratory window, 

 Martha's Vineyard is seen stretching away in the distance 

 till its point is lost behind Nonameset, which in turn is 

 followed by Naushon, by Nashuena, by Cuttyhunk 

 and others. Behind to the west lies Buzzard's Bay with 

 its distant shore and the little Weepecket Islands like dots 

 upon its surface. In front again is Vineyard Sound, 

 the Harbor, Wood's Hole, Quick's Hole, and other holes 

 innumerable, all teeming with life and all within easy 

 reach of the student. 



What a happy hunting ground ! What variety of 

 forms ! What wealth of numbers ! What a paradise for 

 the naturalist! The sandy shores, the rocky points, the 

 muddy bays, the tide-pools, holes and bottoms from the 

 depths in Vineyard Sound to the shallows of Buzzard's 

 Bay, are all astir with life which the student may study 

 at first hand. 



After a year's study at the Laboratory the average 

 student wakes up to the fact that he never knew before 

 what the study of zoology or botany meant. 



He is no longer looking at "stuffed things" wired fast 

 to sticks, or withered, shrunken, faded stuff in glass bottles. 



The specimens are not stuffed with tow nor wired to 

 the rocks, which he gathers from the shores at Wood's 

 Holl, nor do thy float around in alcohol. He learns many 

 new names, but does not spend the summer committing 

 to memory the check-list of species on the coast. He 

 returns to his teaching or college with a larger idea of 

 life; to his reading and work asking how and why and 

 when. He retvirns to every thing with renewed vigor 

 and enthusiasm, except to the college museum. 



The work done at the Laboratory is divided into two 

 very distinct divisions. The institution is at once a 

 centre for the advancement and for the diffusion of knowl- 

 edge; it is a school for teaching and a station for research: 

 and acordingiy the students who annually attend are 

 divided by a distinct line into pupils and investigators. 

 In the first category come those who have had but an 

 elementary course in zoology, who are practically un- 

 acquainted with the methods of work, who must needs 

 have a broad and general knowledge of the structure of 

 the various groups of animals, must become acquainted 

 with the great principles of biology, and the use of the 

 naturalist's instruments, before they can engage in orig- 

 inal research. 



For the needs of this class of students the Marine 

 Biological Laboratory is eminently fitted. In no other 

 institution of its kind has this department been so care- 

 fully and thoroughly developed. The Marine Biological 

 Laboratory is unique in this. It stands alone. It is an 

 entirely new departure, and the student who intends to 

 teach or work in any line of biological investigation has 

 an advantage here that is entirely without equal. 



Each student has his regular table, his locker for 

 instruments, his own reagents and complete outfit for 

 work. In the centre of the room are the aquaria where 

 his living material is kept. Here he may work, as long 

 as he likes, with abundant material, free to ask questions, 

 and with some eniment biologist always at hand in case 

 of difficulty. 



