176 TRANSACTIONS LIVERPOOL BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 
note that his results, so far as they go, are not 
inconsistent with the observations recorded above. He 
found that in Loch Nevis and Loch Hourn the commonest 
Diatoms were Chaetoceras decipiens and LRhizosolenia 
shrubsolii, indicating some oceanic plankton; while else- 
where in that northern area the commonest species is 

the neritic Chaetoceras curvisetum—which agrees with 
our results for these localities. 
Murray states that after the vernal maximum the 
Diatoms diminish in the Scottish waters, but do not 
disappear, and are to be found throughout the summer 
in local banks. Skeletonema costatum he notes as the 
most abundant and characteristic form on the surface 
generally in April, and in Loch Etive in August (this we 
only met with occasionally in our July hauls). The 
table he gives shows that there were fewer species of 
Diatoms in Loch Nevis and Loch Hourn than in the sea 
between Rum and Ardnamurchan—there being 28 in 
the latter column and only 7 in that for Loch Nevis. 
So far, this comparison agrees with the abundant 
phyto-plankton gatherings we obtained off Rum and 
Canna, &c., and the comparatively small catches of 
zoo-plankton in the lochs on the mainland; but our 
hauls, being vertical from the bottom at great depths, 
probably sampled a much larger body of phyto-plankton, 
and included some species that did not appear at the 
surface. 
In the ‘‘ Fauna, Flora and Geology of the Clyde 
Area,’’ published for the meeting of the British 
Association at Glasgow in 1901, Messrs. G. Murray and 
F. H. Blackman give a short (two pages) account of the 
phyto-plankton, which is in the main a summary of the 
above-mentioned report to the Fishery Board. They 
refer to the seasonal changes and the regular alternations 
