i897. SOME NEW BOOKS. 339 



It is also to be remembered that about half of the deep-sea 

 species are known only by single specimens, which, of course, cannot 

 be sacrificed for dissection. Others are so delicate that their 

 dilapidated remains, when brought to the surface, need great skill in 

 interpretation. 



The introduction, referring to matters such as we have just 

 noted, extends only over five pages. The work itself begins as it 

 ends with descriptive technicalities, lists of locahties, and references 

 to literature, without any attempt at generalisation or any anatomical 

 notes even on the commonest forms. It is prefaced by a systematic 

 index and a list of the new genera and species described by the 

 authors ; it concludes with a valuable alphabetical index of the 

 whole. 



The Chimaeroids are regarded as a division of the Elasmo- 

 branchii, termed a sub-class on p. 5, an order on p. 30. No new 

 facts of importance are recorded. The order Malacopterygii (of a 

 class or sub-class not stated) follows, occupying no less than 94 pages, 

 with family-divisions of a more restricted nature than those usually 

 adopted. The arrangement of the Scopeloids is interesting, based 

 upon the disposition of the luminous organs, a character already 

 determined to be of systematic importance by Liitken. The authors, 

 however, obscure their results by the unearthing of long-forgotten 

 names and the (as it appears to us) useless adoption or invention of 

 many new terms. The strange Sternoptychid fish Chmdiodns is 

 shown for the first time to possess an air-bladder. The order 

 Lyopomi, established by Gill for the Halosauridae, follows that of the 

 Malacopterygii, and is itself succeeded by the great order of Apodes 

 (eels), comprising some of the strangest forms of deep-sea fishes. A 

 new species of Pisodontophis from the American coast is recorded as a 

 boring parasitic fish, the dried and shrivelled remains of a closely 

 similar animal being sometimes taken from the interior of salted 

 halibut and codfish. The validity of the genus Cyema is doubted, and 

 the authors think it may perhaps have been founded on a young 

 Neniichthys, with its jaws and tail mutilated and partly repaired. The 

 Heteromi follow with nothing new, and then are arranged the Bery- 

 coids, Scomberoids, Percoids, Scorpsenoids, etc., under the order 

 Teleocephali. 



The work as a whole is so admirable and of such great utilit}^, 

 that it may seem ungracious to conclude our brief notice with severe 

 criticism ; more especially as the authors themselves beg indulgence 

 for their shortcomings, on account of the difficulties and multifarious 

 distractions amid which it was prepared. A treatise of this kind, 

 however, if worth doing at all, is worth doing well ; and a National 

 Museum undertaking it ought at least to provide its officers with every 

 facility to carry out their instructions in the best possible manner. 

 As matters stand, it is obvious that the Government Printing Office 

 deserves a large share of the blame. The preface and introduction 

 are dated before midsummer 1895, ^^^ ^^e title-page is marked with 

 the same year ; yet the publication was not issued until the end of 

 1896, and it did not reach Europe until early this year. If the dilatori- 

 ness of the Office is such after everything is completed, what must it 

 be while the authors are reading the proofs ? Their papers during 

 the last few years, indeed, have often borne witness to their dissatis- 

 faction ; and it ought to be remarked that many of the fishes termed 

 new genera and species in this work have previously been defined in 

 the Proceedings of the same Museum. It is a serious omission in the 

 present treatise, not to have pointed out this fact either in the Introduc- 



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