Thanks for the reaction of Peggy and Charlie but Europe isn't America, we dont have hundreds of musea in each town, province or state or have private sponsored ones, we have our few big national musea and that's it. I can understand that these musea which have to work with a very small staff dont have much time for would-be scientists but my point is more directed against the fact that they do have the information digitalized and scanned but dont spread it. I get many hits from musea on the internet on my quest for "Cossman" but non of them grant you access if you're not an "affiliate" or fieldworker. What I see now is that private persons/companies are buying these very old books, make a digitalized copy and are selling the information which you should be able to get for free from your taxpaid musea (But it's still better they digitalize them than ripping out the plates and selling these for hard cash) Regards, Eddy ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [log in to unmask] - a forum for informal discussions on molluscs To leave this list, click on the following web link: http://listserv.uga.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=conch-l&A=1 Type your email address and name in the appropriate box and click leave the list. ----------------------------------------------------------------------