The year 1893 was one of exceptional interest to the marine zoologist. During the first two months Plymouth experienced a continuous succession of heavy gales, but towards the middle of March the winds became lighter, and the sea, which had been running remarkably high outside the breakwater, subsided. From that time onwards till the middle of September we enjoyed six months of the most delightful weather,—a period, with scarcely a break, of calm seas and almost cloudless skies. Under the influence of the great heat the temperature of the Channel waters rose continuously, until in August it had attained a point unprecedented for quarter of a century; and it was of the highest interest to observe the effect of this high temperature, and of the prolonged calmness of the sea, upon the floating population of the neighbouring portion of the Channel. Numbers of semi-oceanic forms which rarely reach our shores arrived in remarkable profusion. In June the tow-nets were crowded with Salps, while towards the latter end of August they were almost choked by masses of living Radiolaria.

We have recently begun to receive from the French Ministère de la Marine a monthly journal entitled Pêches Maritimes, and published as a supplement to the Revue Maritime et Coloniale. The number for August of this journal commences with an article on La biologie de la sardine, by M. Paul Guéry. This article consists chiefly of summaries of the researches of four zoologists on the reproduction and life-history of the sardine. We have the summaries given under the following headings:

The facts gathered up to the present time with regard to the occurrence of anchovies in the English Channel are briefly as follows:

In November, 1889, large numbers of anchovies were reported to have been taken at Dover in the drift-nets used for sprat fishing. During the same month also numbers were taken by the sprat fishermen in Torbay, in seines.

It is only eight years since the Royal Commission on beam trawling issued its report, and already a Select Committee of Parliament has been appointed to make a new inquiry into one of the principal subjects investigated by that Commission, namely, the decrease of the fish supply and the advisability of remedial measures. Among the conclusions of the Commission was this one:

In recent years the Bulletin of the United States Fish Commission has outgrown its older brother, the Report of the Commissioner, and in some respects supplanted it. The last volume of the Report, part xvii, bears the date of publication 1893, but it was only received by us in the present month of June, 1894, and it refers to operations carried out in the two years 1889–91,—in other words, from three to five years ago. The volume consists of three general reports and six appendices. The former are the Report of the Commissioner, that of Mr. Richard Rathbun on the Inquiry respecting Food-fishes and the Fishing-grounds, and that of Mr. Hugh M. Smith on the Inquiry regarding the Methods and Statistics of the Fisheries. The Appendices comprise three special reports, a Review of Sparoid Fishes, by David Starr Jordan and Bert Fesler, an article on Fish Entozoa, and a translation of Haeckel‘s well-known pamphlet, Plankton-Studien.

In connection with the inquiries which I undertook at the beginning of the present year into the question of the destruction of immature fish I have been investigating since the issue of the last number of the Journal the development of eggs in the ovary of some flat fishes and the history of the ovary before and after maturity is attained. I have made it my special object to trace the history of the ovary from one spawning period to the next, in order that it might be possible to understand more clearly than at present, from the appearance of an ovary examined at any given time, in what stage of development it was. Mr. Holt has made some observations on this subject, and discussed them in his paper in the number of this Journal for November, 1892. He states there that the first approach to maturity in the ovary is denoted by an enlargement of some of the ova, and the assumption by them of an opaque condition. He terms those ova which have begun to get opaque, “active,” and those which have not, “inactive.” In a footnote it is stated that the changes which give rise to the opaque condition are not the same in all species, but that they appear to possess the same significance. Mr. Holt leaves undecided the question whether all the active ova are expelled during the spawning period, so that there is a period following the process of spawning when only “inactive” ova being present, the condition of the ovary is not distinguished by internal structure from that of a fish which has not begun to breed, which is immature.

I have again so many acknowledgments to make for help received that it would be invidious to select names, whilst to enumerate all would unduly trespass on the space allotted to me.

The work, as before, has been carried on at the Marine Fisheries Society's Laboratory at Cleethorpes.

Whilst working at the Laboratory this summer on the function of iodine in Algæ, it was suggested to me by the Director that I should study the influence of Algæ on the ammonia in sea water. I here tender my thanks to Mr. E. J. Bles for his kind advice and assistance.

Fully ten years having elapsed since the Report on Trawling on the eastern shores was presented to the Trawling Commission (composed of the late Earl of Dalhousie, chairman; Right Hon. Edward Marjoribanks, M.P., now Lord Tweedmouth; Prof. Huxley; Mr. W. S. Caine, M.P.; and Mr., now Sir, T. F. Brady), it appears to be desirable to review the statements contained therein in the light of the information which the impetus given by the Commission has produced. Moreover this examination of results is all the more nececssary, since last year another important body—viz. the Select Committee of the House of Commons on Fisheries, presided over by Mr. Majoribanks, M.P.—issued a new blue-book containing the finding of the Committee, and a mass of evidence.

The four charts produced in this number, showing as nearly as possible the positions of the various fishing boats in the neighbourhood of Plymouth, are a continuation of the series of charts already introduced in Nos. 3 and 4 of vol. ii. They represent the conditions found during last September, October, November, and December, and complete the year's observations.

Aphia pellucida, Day (Latrunculus pellucidus, Collett).—An adult male of this species, 2¼ inches long, was taken in the tow-net at the surface south of the Mewstone on June 12th last. When alive was very transparent, with a few scattered black chromatophores along the back and the ventral edge.

In the year 1890 I tried an experiment upon young flounders, with the object of discovering what would be the effect upon the lower sides of the fish if these sides were continually exposed to daylight. Under ordinary conditions the upper side of the fish is dark-coloured, the lower side white; and the upper side is exposed to light, while the lower side being usually in contact with the ground, and always turned away from the sky, is protected from the light. A connection between the difference of the two sides in relation to light and in coloration naturally suggests itself. If the difference in coloration is due to the difference in the exposure of the sides to light, when the lower side of the fish is kept exposed to the light it ought to become coloured.