Dr. A. Gunther on the History of Echeneis. 391 



species, the latter creates two different species of the smaller one*. 

 They consider E. remora as being confined to the European seas. 

 Klein (Miss. Pise. p. 51. no. 1) describes it as "Echeneis coeru- 

 lescens, ore retuso." Gronow gives a better and more detailed 

 description in Zoophyl. p. 75. no. 256, and in Mus. Ichthyol. 

 i. no. 33. It would appear, from his ( System/ p. 92, that he 

 also knew the white variety, for which he creates the name 

 of Echeneis parva, identifying it, however, with E. remora, Linn. 

 He received his specimen from America. 



Edwards knew nothing of the nature of the fish ; he believed 

 that " it feeds on the slimy substance it finds on the skins of 

 the greater fishes " (Gleanings, no. 210) ; the rough drawing in 

 Petiver's Gazophyl. tab. 44. f. 12, is worse than any of those 

 already referred to. 



The species appears to be only an occasional visitor to the 

 English coasts. Pennant f enumerates it for the first time 

 among the British fishes j Turton J took a specimen himself 

 from the back of a cod-fish ; and Sir J. Richardson mentions 

 another instance of its being found on the gills of a shark (Car- 

 charias glaucus). 



Duhamel || gives a good description, but a miserable figure, 

 the sucker looking more like the shell of a Pecten. He attri- 

 butes the adhesion of the sucker to the minute spines, which, 

 entering a body, offer considerable resistance in the direction 

 towards the tail, but none whatever in that towards the head. 



Otto Frederic Mxiller enumerates the fish in the ( Prodromus 

 Faunae Danicse' (no. 361); but it is evidently an accidental 

 visitor to those coasts If. 



Two accurate observers, however, attest its occurrence in still 

 higher latitudes, namely in Iceland : Olafsen (Reise durch Island, 

 ii. p. 207), and Faber (Fische Islands, p. 115) (Styris-fiskr) . 



Of the occurrence of the fish on the coasts of North America 

 we find the first accurate notice in the true and elaborate account 

 of Schoepf **, who at the same time explains the fact of its being 

 spread all over the globe, saying that he saw the fish taken from 

 several vessels newly arrived at New York. Mitchillft also 

 knew the fish well, and declares a specimen taken at New York 

 to be identical with those from the Mediterranean; whilst 



' * System. Ichthyol. ed. Gray, p. 92. 



t Pennant, Brit. Zool. edit. 10. vol. iii. App. p. 524. 



J Turton, Brit. Faun. p. 94. 

 , Yarrell, Brit. Fish. edit. 3. vol. i. p. 671. 



|| Peches, ii. sect. 4. p. 56, pi. 4. f. 5. 



IT I find a reference also to Osbeck, * Voyage to China/ p. 94, a work 

 not accessible to me. 



** Schrift. Gesellsch. naturf. Freunde Berlin, viii. 3. p. 145. 



ft Trans. Lit. and Phil* Soc. New York, i. p. 378. 



