200 AMERICAN JOURNAL 



BracMopoda; total, 41,830 specimens of 516 species of Mol- 

 lusks." 



The two principal objects of the expedition were, to collect 

 for tlie Musenm in Amherst College, and "to ascertain with 

 the certainty of personal observation, what and how many- 

 species of 'shells exist at Panama." Having formerly, the 

 Professor remarks, in his ''Introduction," ''collected about 500 

 marine species in Jamaica, near the centre of the Caribbean 

 Zoological Province, it was thought that a comparison of these 

 authentic materials would not be without interest." A subor- 

 dinate object was to make observations on the habits of the 

 species, in respect of station. 



The results of the expedition were read before the New 

 York Lyceum of Natural History on the 10th of May, 1852, 

 and published in the Annals of that Institution, Vol. V., pp. 

 229 — 549, and subsequently, but in the same year, as a sepa- 

 rate work, under the title already mentioned. Dr. P. P. 

 Carpenter, than whom no one is more competent to re- 

 view with sagacity and in a just and liberal spirit the la- 

 bors of other naturalists, comments, in his invaluable "Report 

 on the Present State of our Knowledge with regard to the 

 Mollusca of the West Coast of North America," ("Report of 

 the Brit. Assoc," 1856,) on the Panama Catalogue, and in terms 

 far more authoritative than any which we could offer, of which 

 the following is a short abstract, his language being, however, 

 scrupulously adopted: — 



"Professor Adams had before collected about the same 

 number of marine species at Jamaica; and, holding the theory* 

 that no species could be common to the two oceans, he was 

 well qualified to detect any sources of error which might 

 have militated against his own hypothesis. The very minute 

 discrimination, also, to which he had accustomed himself in 

 his researches among the land shells of Jamaica, would at 

 once prevent him from confounding similar species. And as 

 he visited no other spot than the shores of Panama, and the 

 neighboring Island of Taboga, there is no danger of the ad- 

 mixture of specimens from different localities. In the work 

 under consideration the author gives all his references from 

 personal research : quotes every assigned habitat, with authori- 

 ties (discriminating original testimony by the mark !); and, in 

 addition to his own remarks, states the number of specimens 

 from which he writes. He was not able to dredge, nor to 



* " It is scarcely necessary to consider the question, whether any of the 

 shells on the opposite sides of tropical America could have had a common 

 origin. Although in some points the Caribbean Sea and the Pacific ap- 

 proach within forty or fifty miles in a direct line, it is difficult to imagine 

 any adequate means of the intercommunication of living marine Mollusks." 

 (C. B. Adams, in "Introduction to Panama Catalogue," p. 9.) 



