Page:The Zoologist, 3rd series, vol 2 (1878).djvu/338

314 condensed account of the salient features of the Natural-History Collections of the Expedition is recorded.

A mere enumeration of species procured, though valuable in a scientific point of view as affording a basis for the study of distribution, fails to convey to the reader any idea of the natural features of the country. In the following notes, therefore, the writer's endeavour has been not to weary the reader with a recapitulation of scientific names, but to bring to his mind's eye some slight idea of the physical aspect of the Polar zone; the paucity, yet interest, of its alpine flora; the extraordinary manner in which mammalian life is supported on a land apparently so barren that a casual observer would pronounce it absolutely desert ; to draw some attention to the amount of invertebrate life in a sea just above the freezing-point ; and to consider those startling changes which must have occurred in the history of our planet to have converted a sea, once crowded with reef-forming corals, to one on which now floats a perennial ice-cap.

The appointment of two gentlemen to accompany the Arctic Expedition of 1875–76 as naturalists, was based upon a recom- mendation of the President and Council of the Royal Society, which received the approval of the Lords Commissioners of Her Majesty's Treasury. Although these appointments interfered with the personnel of the Expedition as first decided on, yet the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, with the greatest liberality, modified the previous arrangement, and made provision for the reception on board of H.M. ships 'Alert' and ' Discovery' of two gentlemen to serve as naturalists, with the same pay, clothing, and emoluments as the lieutenants of the Expedition. In the first instance, the appointment of surgeon and naturalist to both vessels had been combined in persons eminently qualified for both duties, and it is not unnatural to suppose that it must have been a source of considerable disappointment to those gentlemen to find that the official means of carrying out their favourite studies as naturalists were transferred to others, not members of the naval profession. I have therefore the greater pleasure in recording how indebted 1 am to Dr. Edward L. Moss, surgeon of the 'Alert,' and Dr. Richard Coppinger, surgeon of the 'Discovery,' for their valuable and generous assistance during the voyage, and the liberal manner in which their collections were placed at my disposal on the return of the Expedition.