2o6 



The Irish Naturalist. 



October, 



the apt words of Thomas Fuller when he sat down to write 

 an account of Wales — a country he had never seen: — "It 

 matters not," he says, how meanly skilled a writer is so long 

 as he hath knowing and communicative friends." The writer 

 of these notes, having spent some eight months in a very 

 desultory study of his subject along the shores of Co. Dublin, 

 can hardly claim to have so open a mind in matters of marine 

 zoology as was Fuller's in Welsh topography ; but he is quite 

 as happily circumstanced in the matter of " knowing and 

 communicative friends." 



In naming some of the more critical species of mollusca I 

 have received valuable assistance from Mr. A. R. Nichols, 

 whose list of the Marine Mollusca of Ireland^ is so indispen- 

 sable to the student of distribution. I have to thank Mr. 

 Nichols, too, for naming my small collection of Polyzoa. 

 Miss Jane Stephens who, in her recently published list of 

 Irish Coelenterata,^ has so well summed up our present 

 knowledge of this branch of marine zoology, has been good 

 enough to examine some of the more puzzling zoophytes, and 

 a few sponges and sea worms, while Professor Carpenter has 

 kindly named the pycnogons. 



The dredging trips whose results are given here were five 

 in number. They extended no farther seaward than Rockabill, 

 some five miles from Skerries harbour, nor did any of them 

 carry the dredge into soundings deeper than 15^ fathoms^ 

 low water. The boats used were the ordinary row boats of 

 the local line and lobster fishermen — rather roomy, steady 

 craft of broad beam, and carrying sail enough to enable us 

 to change ground or run home rapidly on the rare occasions 

 when the wind was favourable. Twenty-four eff"ectual hauls 

 were made. These were so distributed as to test all the 

 different types of bottom known to the fishermen. Stiff mud, 

 mixed mud and sand, gravel, and pure sand, were all sampled 

 again and again, and one or two cautious scrap.es were made 

 over rocks. The best ground was found to lie north and 

 east of St. Patrick's Island, or Church Island, as it is called 

 by the Skerries folk. The deepest scrape, and perhaps the 



(1) Proc. R.J. A., 3rd Sen, vol. v., 110. 4, 1900. 



(2) F7-0C. R.I. A., vol. XXV., Sec. B., 110. 3, 1905. 



