322 SUPPLEMENT ON 



have been received in Europe from both North and South 

 America, from most parts of the Indian Seas, and from the 

 Pacific Ocean. The Gerres Plumieri is the most common 

 fish at Porto Rico. Its flesh is remarkable for the rapidity 

 with which it is decomposed ; it becomes quite soft a very 

 short time after the fish is caught. 



The Gerres rhombeus appears to be indifferently repre- 

 sented in Sloane, under the name of Pagrus totus argenteus, 

 and stone-bass. It might be referred to the latter, or to a 

 species called Brasilianus. Sloane tells us that it is one of 

 the best fishes of Jamaica, and that it is taken as well in 

 the sea round that island, as in the rivers and fresh waters of 

 its interior. 



Mr. Couch relates, in the Linnaean Transactions, that 

 specimens of this species are sometimes seen to arrive in 

 numbers on the coast of Cornwall, following pieces of wood 

 covered with anatifae, from which it would seem that they 

 feed on these animals, but Cuvier never found any thing in 

 their stomach but the remains of small fish. 



In the sixth family, Squammipennis, especially in the 

 genus CHiETODON, the seas of the torrid zone possess ani- 

 mals not less ornamented by the hand of nature than the 

 countries whose shores are bathed by these waters. If the hot 

 countries of Africa and America have among their feathered 

 tribes their souimangas, their humming birds, their cotingas, 

 and their tanagers, the intermediate seas support myriads of 

 the finny race still more brilliant, whose scales reflect the 

 tints of metals and precious stones, heightened in effect by 

 spots and bands of a more sombre hue, distributed with a 

 symmetry and variety equally admirable. 



The genus chsetodon has many species in which nature ap- 

 pears almost to have disported herself by clothing them in 

 the most gaudy manner. Rose, purple, azure, and velvety 

 black, are distributed along the surface of their bodies, in 



