off the Southern coast of New England. 298 
A. P. Chapin, of Warsaw, N. Y., made the temperature obser- 
vations and records of soundings, ete. 
The party immediately associated with the writer in the 
zoological investigations consisted of Professor 8. I Smith and 
Mr. J. H. Emerton (artist), of Yale College; Dr. T. H. Bean 
and Mr. Richard Rathbun, of the National Museum; Mr. 
Sanderson Smith, of New York; Professor L. A. Lee, of Bow- 
doin College; Mr. B. F. Koons, Mr. E. A. Andrews, and Mr. 
H. L. Bruner, graduates and special zoological students of the 
Sheffield Scientifie School of New Haven, and Mr. Peter 
Parker, of Washington. Most of these gentlemen have been 
associated with me, in the same way, in previous years. 
e off-shore regions explored this year are included between 
N. lat. 39° 40’ and 40° 22’; and between W. long. 69° 15’ 
aud 71° 32’. They occupy a region about 42 miles wide, north 
and south; and about 95 miles long, east and west, or about 
105 miles along the 100-fathom line. 
Series of dredgings have also been made this season, off Cape 
od; in Vineyard Sound; in Buzzard’s Bay; and off Martha’s 
Vineyard, between the deep-water and shallow-water localities 
of former years. Other dredgings will be made later, this 
season. 
It is probable that the remarkable richness of the fauna in 
this region, both in the number of species and in the surprising 
abundance of the individuals of many of them, is due very 
largely to the unusual uniformity of the temperature enjoyed, at 
all seasons of the year, at all those depths that are below the 
Immediate effects of the atmospheric changes. e region 
under discussion is subject to the combined effects of the Gulf 
Stream on one side and the cold northern current on the other, 
together with the gradual decrease in temperature in proportion 
to the depth. It is, therefore, probable that at any given depth, 
below 50 fathoms, the temperature is nearly the same at all 
Seasons of the year. Moreover, there is, in this region, an active 
Circulation of the water, at all times, due to the combined cur- 
rents and tides. The successive zones of depth represent suc- 
cessively cooler climates more perfectly here than near the coast. 
vast quantities of free-swimming animals, continually 
brought northward by the Gulf Stream, and filling the water, 
both at the surface and bottom, furnish an inexhaustible supply 
of food for many of the animals.inhabiting the bottom, and 
proably, directly or indirectly, to nearly all of them. A ver 
arge species of Salpa, often five or six inches long, occurs bot 
at the surface and close to the bottom, in vast quantities. Some- 
times several bushels come up in a single haul of the trawl. I 
ave taken this same Salpa, in very numerous instances, from 
he stomachs of starfishes of many kinds, from Actiniw o 
