Some explanation is due to the members of the Association for the delay in the publication of the Journal, which in the ordinary course would have appeared in November, 1893. It is proposed for the future to issue the half-yearly parts in July and January, and accordingly the publication of the present number was deferred from November of last year to January, 1894. Unforeseen circumstances affecting myself have caused a further postponement, but the customary punctuality in the appearance of the Journal will be observed in the future.

I. On The Destructionof Immature fishin the North Sea

Introductory.—Owing to enforced idleness during the period which would otherwise have been devoted to preparing my reports for publication, I am under the necessity of reserving much of the information collected during the last four months for a future occasion, and of treating only in the briefest possible manner the few subjects selected for present discussion. I have again to express my obligations for much courtesy and assistance received from members of the Grimsby fishing community, and to the Marine Fisheries Society of the same town for cordial co-operation in the work carried on at their laboratory and aquarium at Cleethorpes.

At the request of the Secretary I venture to send you a brief account of the voyage we made last year in the smack “Albert” 97 tons register, belonging to the Council of the Mission to Deep Sea Fishermen.

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:

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.

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.