GARMAX : THE CHIMAEEOIDS, 2G9 



pensfere, aud Pegase, and Lis fourth and last order of the cartilaginous fishes, 

 the Tdlecbranches, contained three families properly belonging to the bony 

 fishes. It is not necessary to follow the remainder of the orders, as they are 

 outsitle of the limits of this paper. It will be seen that if the bony fishes im- 

 properly included are withdrawn from the second order, the Chismopnes, 

 the only reason for its existence lies in the genus Chimaera. Dume'ril gives 

 the derivation of the word Chismopnes as " de Xla-fir) fente et de Uveas res- 

 pirant." If he had derived it from XdcTfj.a or Xdcrfir] and made the word Chas- 

 matopnes or Chasmopne's, or from ^xi-crfxa or "^x^iafxi], making the word to be 

 Schismatopnes or Schismopnes there might have been less (juestioning of the 

 etymology. It is only a change of a letter in either case, but authorities differ 

 as to wliether a correction should be applied. 



llafinesque, 1815, also lost sight of the limits between the cartilaginous and 

 the bony fishes. He took Dumeril's thir<l order for his own sixth, and latinized 

 the Frenih name Chismopne's in the form Chismopnea. He placed in this 

 order the family Branchismea, with three subfamilies, the Chimeria, the Balis- 

 tia, and the Lophidia, and the family Meiopteria, with two subfamilies of eels, 

 the Echelia and the Chlopsidia. All of this order except the Chimeria be- 

 longed among the bony fishes. His seventh order, the Tremapnea, was with 

 considerable additions Dumeril's first, the Trematopnes. Rafinesque put into 

 this order (1) the Ophictia, consisting of three subfamilies of eels, (2) the Pla- 

 giostomia, Dumeril's Plagiostomes, with two subfamilies, the Antacea, Sharks, 

 and the Platosomia, Skates, and Rays, and (3) the Cyclostomia, with two sub- 

 families, the Lampredia and the Myxinia. As in case of Dumeril's Chismop- 

 nes, the future of Rafinesque's Chismopnea depended wholly on his Chimeria. 



Cuvier, 1817, again made a more exact separation of the Chondroptei-ygii 

 and the bony fishes, in Avhich Rafinesque's Chismopnea were widely scattered; 

 the Balistia became Plectognathes (Plcctognatha Latr., 1825, Plectognathi 

 Bonap., 1831), the Lophidia became Acanthopterygiens, the ^Meiopteria became 

 Malacopterygiens apodes, and the Chimeria were placed in the Chondropt^- 

 rygiens a branchies fixes under Les Chimeres. The two genera Chimaera and 

 Callorhynchus were accepted by Cuvier. His changes notwithstanding, the 

 order Chismopnea still existed by virtue of the Chimaeroids contained in it. 



Latreille, 1825, made use of the name Ichthyodera for his third class, 

 Cuvier's Chondropterygiens a branchies fixes, plueing in this class two orders, 

 the first, Selacii, Dumeril's Plagiostomes, with three families, the Squalides, 

 the Platysoma, and the Acanthorhina (Chimaerae), and the second, Cyclos- 

 toma, with two families, the Auloedibranehia (Petromyzonidae) and the Diporo- 

 branchia (Mvxinidae). The name Acanthorhina cannot be looked upon as 

 particularly appropriate since BlainviUe, 1816, had used Acanthorhinus for 

 Spinacoid sharks. 



Bonaparte, 1831, subdivided his subclass Chondropterygii into Section 1 

 Chismopnei (Branchiati) and Section 2, Trematopnei (Spiraculati). In the 

 first he placed his order 6, Eleutheropomi (Sturiones), Family 32, Acipenseri- 

 dae, and his order 7, Acanthorrhini, Family 33, Chimaeridae ; and in the second 



