Page:GrouseinHealthVol1.djvu/22

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xviii
INTRODUCTION

Considering all these circumstances, the results now published do not seem unduly belated.

The Committee specially desire to record their thanks to the following gentle- men who have formed the Scientific Staff of the Inquiry, and to whose labours the results are due:—

Edward A. Wilson, M.B., F.Z.B., M.B.O.U., was appointed, in November 1905, principal Field Observer, Anatomist and Physiologist to the Inquiry, and devoted his whole time to the work till the autumn of 1910, when he joined Captain Scott's Antarctic Expedition as Scientific Director on the Terra Nova. It is difficult to speak highly enough of Dr. Wilson's services, for not only was he an indefatigable worker in the field, but his ornithological knowledge, his scientific training, and his artistic skill, have been of the utmost value in every branch of the Inquiry. Practically every Grouse which was submitted to the Committee for examination was dissected and reported on by Dr Wilson, and the results of these dissections, as shown in Appendix D, not only form a record of long and patient labour, but also provide an enormous mass of carefully arranged material which has been of great use to the Committee. Dr Wilson has written or aided in writing ten out of the first fourteen (Chapters of the Book, and has not only fully illustrated his own contributions, but has placed his artistic skill at the disposal of nearly all the other writers. In addition to his services as Field Observer and Physiologist, Dr Wilson conducted a series of experiments on live Grouse at the Committee's Observation Area whereby the results obtained by Dr Leiper, Dr Shipley and others were put to the test ; these experiments entailed some years of hard and patient work, and required the closest co-operation with the other members of the Scientific Staff. Dr Wilson's personal qualities secured for him the willing assistance alike of Local Correspondents and Scientific Staff, and went far to ensure whatever success the Committee has achieved.

A. E. Shipley, M.A., Hon. D.Sc, F.R.S., Master of Christ's College, Cambridge, and Reader in Zoology in the University of Cambridge, undertook in June 1905 to assist the Committee in the Scientific Departments of their research, especially in connection with the investigations of the ectoparasites and endoparasites of Grouse. Dr Shipley's services to the scientific side of the Inquiry have been as important as Dr Wilson's services to the natural history side. Dr