net, will be kept from injuring themselves or their neighbours by banging about upon the bottom.
The more brief the period during which the specimens are in transitu the better. Hence they should be always forwarded per mail train, and either be received at the terminus by the owner, or else be directed "To be forwarded immediately by special messenger." The additional expense of this precaution is very small, and it may preserve half the collection from death through long confinement.
The packages should be opened immediately on arrival; several bowls, pans, &c., should be ready, each half-filled with sea-water. The water in the vessels just received should be carefully dipped or poured off, and the specimens placed one by one in the bowls. Thus you will not only see which are alive and healthy, and which are sickly or dead, but the weeds, shells, &c., will be rinsed from the sediment, which has been abraded during the rattling of the specimens in travelling. The specimens can afterwards be deposited in the Aquarium, their permanent home.
Should any of the more delicate animals appear, much exhausted, they may often be restored, by a prompt aëration of the water around them. This is most readily effected by means of the Syringe, as I shall presently describe.
GENERAL DIRECTIONS.
The Aquarium is then established. The water, which at first is somewhat turbid, becomes in the course of a day or two clear and crystalline; the plants
