36 MEMOIR OP 



and P. Gyllius ; and that of the kraJcen^ the arbot% 

 is from Pliny and Massaria, a sea-monster of vast 

 dimensions, which has been noticed in the Atlantic 

 ocean, not far from Gibraltar. 



It -svill be observed that these descriptions, though 

 alluding to the inhabitants of the ocean, yet really do 

 not refer to true fish, according to the more accurate 

 classification of modem times. None of these latter, 

 however, are omitted in this first book, the whole 

 receiving a full share of attention. On the other 

 hand, the second book or part, being composed only 

 of fishes properly so called, and all these being 

 accompanied by plates prepared from drawings made 

 under the author's eye, or that of his friends, these 

 other aquatic animals, whether mammalia, reptiles, 

 shell-fish, or zoophites, are wholly excluded from it. 

 Before, then, leaving this portion of the work, we 

 shall adduce a specimen or two of the account it 

 supplies of tnie fishes, and we shall take these very 

 much as they occur in the alphabetical table. The 

 fish called Acanthias, the AKxv6txi of the Greeks, 

 claims attention from naturalists, as it is the one 

 whose name most approximates, and which pro- 

 bably suggested to Artedi the appellation of his 

 most numerous order the Acanthopterygii, those 

 which have their rays or fins hard, simple, and in 

 form of spines ; a name which, being adopted by 

 Baron Cuvier, ^vill probably long retain its distin- 

 guished position. These acanthopterygii are the 

 first and most numerous order of the osseous fishes, 

 which are contradistinguished fi'om the ckondro2>' 



