[904] CORRESPONDENXE. 179 



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Metlakatlah, B.C., Nov. 5th, 1904. 

 The Editor Ottawa Naturalist. 



Dear Sir, — Enclosed I send you an extract from a letter from 

 Mr. Rathbun, Assistant Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 

 in charg^e of the U. S. National Museum, giving the name of some 

 smallfi-h sent from this locality. It occurs to me that the iden- 

 tifications contained therein may be of interest to some of the 

 readers of the Ottawa Naturalist. 



Yours truly, 



(Signed) J. H. Keen. 



"The specimens which you transmitted to the National 

 Museum, have been received and examined by one of our ichthyo- 

 logists, who informs me that they are stickleba ks representing the 

 species Gasterosteus williamsoni microcephalus. This species was 

 described by Dr. Charles Girard in the Proceedings of the 

 Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia in 1854. The speci- 

 mens which Dr. Girard stud ed were obtained in Four Creek, a 

 tributary of Tule (Tul .re) Lake, San Joaquin \''alley, Calitornia, 

 by Dr. A. L. Heermann, a naturalist who accompanied the sur- 

 veying party of the Pacific Railroad route. The range of this 

 particular species of stickleback is along' the wesr coast of 

 America fro n Lower C,^;ifornia to Alaska. It is found in lakes 

 and streams and is generally abundant. 



" Sticklebacks of various species are found throughout the 

 northern hemisphere. They are noted for their pugnacity and are 

 interesting for their nest building habits, a full acco'jnt of which 

 Will be found in Standard Natural Hi-«tory, Volume HI, puhliv-hed 

 by S. E. Cassino Company, of Boston, Massachusetts, in 1885. 



" With the fishes were found some leeches which have been 

 identified by Dr J. Percy Moore, of the University of Pennsylvania, 

 Philadelphia, as representing- the species Hcemopis Lateralis (Say)." 



