68 TRANSACTIONS LIVERPOOL BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



British pioneers Edward Forbes, Wyville Thomson and John 

 Murray, and a final discussion of some recent bio-chemical 

 results as affecting the metabolism of the seas in our own 

 neighbourhood. 



It will not be necessary to refer to each of these reports in 

 detail, but it may be noted that those for 1909 and the few 

 following years record various investigations, both morpholo- 

 gical and physiological, undertaken by some of our younger 

 adherents, such as Dr. W. J. Dakin, Dr. J. Pearson, Mr. W. 

 Riddell, Mr. R. D. Laurie and Dr. H. E. Roaf. 



In 1910 we added a new research wing to the building, 

 measuring 44 feet by 18 feet, and two* storeys high, which 

 provided a useful tank room on the ground floor opening into 

 the back yard, and a series of eight small work-rooms for 

 researchers above. Our records show that we have had 419 

 workers in the present Biological Station since 1902 ; and the 

 total number of workers from the Puffin Island days onwards 

 has been 506. 



This year is also notable as being that in which we held 

 at Port Erin in the summer a first course of lectures, demon- 

 strations and practical work dealing with Oceanography from 

 both the hydrographical and biological points of view, full 

 details of which are given in the 24th Report, and in conducting 

 which I had the able assistance of Dr. Dakin and Dr. Roaf. 



" Oceanography — the science of the sea — has for its 

 scope the determination of the physical, chemical, and 

 biological characters of the oceans of the world, and of the 

 cause of those great seasonal variations in the microscopic 

 living contents upon which depend man's supply of food from 

 the sea, and the continuance of many human industries. There 

 are scarcely any more wide-spread phenomena in nature, and 

 probably none of more importance to man, than those vast 

 periodic changes in the minute organisms of the sea, the 

 causes of which are now being sought by oceanographers both 



