like character of the dogfish was quite noticeable in its feeding. In a pool at Woods Hole they have quite a number of them. I would throw a fish in there at one end of the pool when the dogfish were at the other, and in a few minutes they would be attracted evidently by the smell of the fish, without seeing it, and would come around it just like hounds scenting their prey; that is, by running their noses back and forth until they touched the fish, and then they would seize it. That is different from the characteristic of the sand-shark and others, which simply come around singly and bore their noses into the sand in the region of the dead fish wthout seeming able to see it. But I think this curious hound-like characteristic of scenting their prey was rather indicative of the dogfish.

Another thing: Mr. Nichols perhaps did not make quite clear the difference between a mounted shark or a cast of a shark and the one that he showed of the cub shark being prepared in the museum. Now that is modeled by a sculptor, one of the men employed here, modeled by hand and put into a correct and lifelike position which it is practically impossible to get by simply laying down a large or small fish and casting it; and I think anybody who looks at that specimen as finished will realize that difference. In that case the living character has been copied. There is an extremely graceful turn of the body characteristic of all the sharks which is shown in a way that I think has never been indicated before, and which it is quite impossible to show, as I say, in simply casting it from the dead fish. I think it shows rather a departure in the line of exhibition of large fishes. If you can get a man who is artistic enough to copy the character accurately, then by all means have it done that way in preference to the ordinary cast.

MR. R. W. MINER, New York City: I think that in connection with this address of Mr. Nichols perhaps one phase of his exhibit of fishes in the American Museum was not quite fully dealt with.

Of course the primary purpose of an exhibition in this museum as a public institution is that it should be educational in character. We have our collections here arranged in as scientific a manner as possible for the use of specialists who desire to investigate particular groups; these we have in the past placed in convenient storage cases, so that they can be readily taken out and handled by specialists. But for the exhibition halls there is quite another point of view. We owe a duty to the public of this city from whom we receive a great deal of our support; and that duty is one of education. Our exhibits are not only for the public at large who may wander into our halls, but also for the children of that public who are brought up in our schools and in contact with natural science in an elementary form through the teachers of the public schools. It is to them, of course, that we look in the future for the development of a good many of these questions that touch most nearly our economic problems. I believe, in common with the rest of the scientific staff of the museum, that the development of an interest in the problems connected with our natural history, in the principal problems of the fisheries, for an immediate example, is what may be considered our immediate duty to the rising generation. And,

therefore, instead of presenting long lines of exhibition cases with alcoholic specimens in them, we have tried in the past to present our exhibits in an attractive form and from the point of view of the course of study in the schools; so that teachers may impress upon their pupils those lessons which it is most desirable to impress, and particularly connected with those economic problems that it is our duty and our pleasure to solve.

It is necessary, therefore, to make selections from our scientific collections; not only that, but to substitute for the shrunken and bleached material which we ordinarily find in alcohol-for the dried specimens which are sometimes exhibited in a shrunken condition for the larger fishes the lifelike representation of the actual fish; to teach these elementary students facts which will not be distorted through methods of preparation.

Therefore we have taken, in the case of the fishes, casts and models and plates which will represent fish more accurately than it is possible to do with the alcoholic specimens, and then those have been arranged with a labeling which it is intended shall appeal to two different sets of people in the first place to the elementary students of the public school and in the next place to the more advanced of the morphological and biological students who come to us from our universities.

THE NATURAL HISTORY OF THE WEAKFISH

BY THEODORE GILL

Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Society: I did not anticipate being called upon this afternoon, and, consequently, I did not come prepared with my paper, but I will give orally the essentials of what I have written.

Every once in a while I receive a letter asking what is the weakfish; every once in a while in Washington I am appealed to orally to know what the trout is. It is only a few weeks since a lady wrote me saying that her family had a country place in Maryland which they occupied during the summer, and that they could get no fish but so-called trout; she knew what a trout was very well and knew that the fish which they called trout and which sold as trout was not a true trout; and she asked me what it was. I told her. Now the so-called trout of the Southern States and of the Atlantic States from Pennsylvania southward, is not at all related to the true trout, but is a member of an entirely distinct family and even a distinct primary division or order.

Our nomenclature of fishes generally is a very mixed one, and several different modes have been adopted in framing and applying popular names. One (and the most natural one) is to name the fish after that which is—or is supposed to be-most like it. That was the plan adopted especially in the New England States. When the pilgrims proceeded to New England they found a number of fishes which they thought were like the ones they knew at home, and, consequently, they applied the names familiar to them, and misapplied many of them. Many of the names, of course, did fit, such as the trout, codfish, and several others. Naturally they applied because the American fishes were almost the same as, or at least, very closely related to, the fish of England. The trout of our northern waters, indeed,

belongs to a different genus of fish from the English trout; nevertheless, it is so nearly like that it was quite reasonable to name it as such; but when we go southward, the case is very different. The trout of that section, I repeat, is by no means the same as the trout of New England nor that of old England. Such is the first method.

A second method is to apply some name distinctive of quality. The method has been followed in the case of the common fish called in New York the weakfish. Inasmuch as that name is used by a population numbering in round numbers 6,000,000, or nearer 7,000,000 now-that is, in the city of New York and in the immediate vicinity, New Jersey and Long Island-weakfish is the name in most general use.

A third mode of nomenclature is manifest to a more limited extent. It is exemplified by squeteague, supposed to be of Indian derivation and formerly used, it has been claimed, by the Indians of Narragansett Bay, but there is not complete justification for that belief. The derivation appears plausible, but J. Hammond Trumbull, an authority of first rank on Indian philology, was unable to find any instance of the word as an Indian name in any book that he examined. So, therefore, we do not positively know what the origin is. The name squeteague, nevertheless, is at present in most general literary use. It was declared by Goode and others, for example, that squeteague was the best term applicable; consequently, it has been accepted in most of the books on fishes and has been quite generally adopted.

The name "trout" is used universally in the southern Atlantic States, and is practically the only name known there.

Now as to the reasons for these names: "Weakfish" you will find given in sporting books, in the Century Dictionary, and other works, as meaning weak in the mouth. That is, it was apparently applied to the fish because it had