No. 379.] EDITORIALS. 519 
of any arrangement which the individual student may require, the 
advantage of cards becomes striking. Dr. Field’s work is inter- 
national in its character and receives financial support from societies 
both in this country and abroad, as well as from the Swiss govern- 
ment. It is under the special care of a committee of the Inter- 
national Zodlogical Congress. The work is, however, so expensive 
that Dr. Field finds himself embarrassed from lack of funds in his 
work. It is quite certain that if more subscribers could be obtained 
the merits of the undertaking would insure the permanency and 
gradual extension of the work. All professional zodlogists, physiolo- 
gists, and anatomists are urged to correspond with Dr. Field, with 
whom arrangements for cards covering a certain group, such as 
Coleoptera, or a single system of organs, such as the Nervous 
System, can be made. 
Methods in Systematic Work. — In a recent account of some 
marine annelids of the Pacific coast Prof. H. P. Johnson has based 
his descriptions and measurements “ almost entirely ” upon preserved 
specimens, and states that “there are positive objections in taking 
measurements from living worms,” and that only in respect to color 
is there “any advantage in drawing up descriptions from living 
specimens.” ‘To be sure, among the higher annelids, the creeping 
forms, contractions and distortions in preserved material are not so 
aggravated as in the swimming and tubicolous forms, and in the 
latter the difficulty of making drawings or even descriptions from 
the living animals might be advanced as a positive objection. On 
the other hand, the poses and flexures of the worms in motion, aside 
from mere color, are often highly characteristic. The author adds, 
in extenuation of his method, that “ nearly all annelid measurements 
extant have been made upon alcoholic material.” This is true, but 
why? Because the greater part of the annelid literature, the larger 
works certainly, have not been based upon collections made by the 
authors themselves, but upon collections gathered by expeditions or 
accumulated in museums. On the other hand, the supreme value of 
such works as those of Schmarda and Claparéde cannot be denied. 
The ideal condition would be a combination of the two. The natu- 
ralist is most fortunate who has living material for study, and willfully 
to ignore such study is evil. A habit-picture, if merely a description, 
does require a skilled artist, and is well worth the pains. It is to be 
deplored that the good old-fashioned methods of nature study, where 
descriptions were more than mere formulz, are e falling into disuse. 
