60 HAECKEL 



them. There is a large aquarium at hand. You 

 sit down to your microscope, and work. The 

 material is "fresh to hand" every day. There 

 are now many of these stations at well-exposed 

 spots on the coast in various countries — sea- 

 observatories, as it were, in which the student 

 examines his marine objects much as the 

 astronomer observes his planets and comets and 

 double stars at night. To-day, when a young 

 man is taking up zoology, and he is asked what 

 university he is going to, he may say that he 

 is going down to the coast, to Naples, to do 

 practical work. "When the long vacation comes, 

 swarms of professors go from the inland towns 

 to one or other seaside place, as far as the purse 

 will take them. All this is a new thing under 

 the sun. The zoologist of the olden days sat in 

 his study at home. He caught and studied what- 

 ever was found in his own district. The rest came 

 by post — skins, skeletons, amphibians and fishes 

 in spirit, dried insects, hard shells of Crustacea, 

 mussels and snails of all sorts ; but only the 

 shells always, the hard, dry parts of star- 

 fishes, sea-urchins, corals, &c. Animals of the 

 rarest character were thrown away because they 

 could not very well be preserved in spirit and 

 sent from the North Sea or the Mediterranean 

 to Professor Dry-as-dust. In this state of things 

 the advance in microscopic work brought no 

 advantage. But at last it dawned on students 

 that the sea is the cradle of the animal world. 

 Whole stems of animals flourished there, and 



