of the Fishery Board for Scotland. 
363 
most of them disappearing very soon. He suggests it might be found 
worth while to establish artificial mussel-beds in the locality. In the 
same volume, Mr J. C. Thompson describes tow-net collections from the 
west coast of Norway. He refers to the general absence of ovisacs among 
marine Copepoda ; and states his opinion that one of the most abundant, 
Calanus fimnarchicus, so important as food for the herring, casts its ova 
directly into the water, just as fishes do. The general absence of ovisacs 
in females of marine pelagic copepods was much impressed upon me two 
or three years ago when working at the group ; and as Mr Thompson, to 
whom I wrote on the subject, promised to pay attention to the point, and 
has been engaged since in their study, it may be now generally accepted 
that these forms cast their ova free into the water. Grobben, some years 
ago, proved that this was the case with Calanus^ which he kept in a 
watch-glass until the eggs were deposited. The volume also contains 
reports on various groups of marine invertebrates found in the district. 
Mr George Brook * has described the larval stages of Motella cimbria. 
A shoal of the larvae of this species was met with at the surface, in 
September, in Whiting Bay, Arran. A peculiarity of Motella is the 
enormous development of the ventral fins in the larva3 ; Mr Brook gives a 
table showing the relative development of the fins in larvae of different 
sizes. 
2. THE UNITED STATES. 
The Fourteenth Eeport of the United States Fish Commission, that for 
1886, was published last year; it is a bulky volume of over 1000 pages. 
The work of the United States Fish Commission may be divided into two 
branches ; first, inquiries into the fishing grounds, and the life-histories, 
reproduction, &c, of the food- fishes frequenting them ; and second, 
operations in the hatching of fish and shell-fish. In 1886 operations were 
carried on along the Eastern coast from the Straits of Florida to 
Newfoundland, and inquiries were made into the range and habits of the 
important food-fishes, such as the halibut, the mackerel, menhaden, 
sardine, &c. In 1886 the Commission became possessed of an additional 
vessel, the 'Grampus,' a sailing ship specially constructed to carry on 
fishery work, and provided with a well in which marine fishes can be 
kept alive and transported to the hatcheries where their eggs may be 
available. The * Grampus ' is fitted for using a beam, trawl to test its 
commercial utility in American waters, where, however, the flat-fishes are 
not by any means so important as in Europe. 
It is intended to utilise a welled vessel like the ' Grampus ' to trans- 
port valuable food-fishes from Europe, such as the sole, turbot, plaice, and 
brill, which are not found in American waters. In 1886 several con- 
signments of English soles were received alive from England ; they were 
kept at Wood's Holl in the hope of using them for breeding purposes. 
Among other fishes whose artificial propagation has been undertaken are 
the halibut, which is getting scarce on the old fishing grounds, the cod, the 
mackerel, the black bass, the perch, smelt, white fish, and various species 
of salmonidae. Hundreds of thousands of young cod, hatched at Wood's 
Holl, have been successfully transported to the Gulf of Mexico and 
Chesapeake Bay, with the hope of forming cod colonies at these places. 
By means of the 1 Grampus ' over 43,000,000 cod eggs were made avail- 
able at Wood's Holl, and of these 20,000,000 were hatched and planted 
in the immediate vicinity of the station. In 1886 the Commission dis- 
tributed over ninety millions of shad fry which were planted in various 
* Proc. Boy. Phys. Soc. Edin., vol. x. part L, 1889. 
