EDITORIAL. 
A Plea for Systematic Work.— The systematist is under a 
cloud. At the biological station the naturalist of extensive acquaint- 
ance with species is looked upon with disdain by the budding zoolo- 
gist still flushed with the pride of receiving his bachelor’s degree. 
The systematist is considered a relic of a bygone age; a man who 
through lack of proper advantages is unequipped to do the superior 
class of work required in morphology and embryology. The new 
biologist, nurtured on “types,” is quite contented if he labels the 
eggs he has collected “nudibranch” or “shrimp.” If he descends 
to specific names, our eastern crayfish is, for him, “ Astacus fluvia- 
tilus,” and any frog is “ Rana esculenta.” Thus the reaction from 
the work of the species monger has led to carelessness of specific 
names. 
Now, this is all wrong. Nothing is better known than that 
related species may differ considerably in morphological and physio- 
logical characters. When studies of such characters, made on 
unknown species, are published, they are apt to form the basis of 
profitless disputes due to the fact that, unwittingly, different species 
have been used by two or more investigators. Moreover, this 
neglect of specific characters leads to superficial observations, as a 
result of which facts of cecology and adaptation to environment go 
unobserved. Also, fhe scientific study of variation and the origin of 
species depends upon the observation of individual and specific 
characters, so that the present disregard of species is hindering the 
development of this new field of investigation. 
One great obstacle to systematic work is partly responsible for the 
present neglect of such work. This is the fact that our species, 
particularly our marine invertebrates, are inadequately described. — 
Even in the case of the groups which have been studied, the descrip- 
tions of species are scattered in a score of journals and separate 
publications, so that one cannot hope to have all at hand when one 
wishes to determine a form. Check-lists, however useful to deter- 
mine distribution, do not meet the needs of the naturalist. Synoptic 
works, doing what Gould and Binney’s work has done for the Mol- 
lusca of our northeastern coast, are needed likewise for other groups. 
Such works, which require for their highest usefulness figures of 
