CLASS PISCES. 209 



other, Trick, savala, Cuv., is still less elongated, and 

 has a smaller eye \ 



A second tribe comprehends genera in which the 

 mouth is small, and but slightly cleft. 



Gymnetrus, Block. 



The body elongated and flat, as in all the preceding 

 divisions, and totally deprived of the anal fin ; but 

 there is a long dorsal, whose lengthened anterior rays 

 form a sort of plume, but they are easily broken ; the 

 ventrals, when not worn or broken, are very long, 

 and the caudal, composed of very few rays, rises ver- 

 tically from the extremity of the tail, which ends in a 

 small hook. There are six rays in the gills ; the 

 mouth is slightly cleft, very protractile, and furnished 

 with but few and small teeth. Some small spines on 

 the lateral line, which are more salient tojvards the 

 tail. These fishes are extremely soft, and their rays 

 very fragile. They have been frequently and incor- 

 rectly figured from mutilated specimens 2 ; their bones, 



1 A transposition in the text of Nieuhof has caused electric pro- 

 perties to be attributed to the trichiuri of India, which they most 

 assuredly do not possess. 



2 The Falx venetorum of Belon, of which Gouan has made his 

 genus Trachypterus, and which has become the Cepola trachyptera, 

 Gmel., only differs from the Teenia altera of Rondel. 327-, and even 

 from his Teenia prima, which is the Cepola teenia, L , and from the 

 Spada maxima, Imperati, 517., or Cepola gladius of Walbaum, and 

 from the Taenia falcata, Aldrov., or Cepola iris of Walbaum, in the 



VOL. X. P 



