630 Bulletin 4J, United States National Museum. 



Esox oliiensit* Kirti,ani>, Proc. Cleveland Academy Nat. Science, February 7, 1854, 85, Mahon- 

 ing River. 



Represented in the head waters of the Mississippi and its tributaries by 



925b. LUCIUS MASiJl'INOXGT IMMACULATUSf (Garrard). 



(Great Northern Pike.) 



Body unspotted, or with vague, dark cross shades; tail a little more 



slender and fins a little higher than in the spotted or lake mnskallunge. 



Lakes and rivers of Wisconsin and Minnesota, locally abundant, (immac- 



ulatus, unspotted.) 



Eioa; inimi(cii/i>(»s, Garrark MS. ; noticed in different fishing journals; Eagle Lake, northern 



■Wisconsin. 

 Esox masquinongy immaailalux, Jordan, Man. Vert., Ed. 5, 89, 1888. 



Family XCII. PCECILIID^.t 

 (The Killipishes.) 

 Body oblong or moderately elongate, compressed behind, depressed 

 forward, covered with rather large cycloid scales, which are adherent and 



* We aro indebted to Mr. Barton A. Bean for the following copy of Kirtland's description : 



"IV. Esdx oltiensis, Kirtland : From a very perfect stucco cast and a dessicated head of a 

 specimen taken in the Mahoning, a tributary of the Ohio River, it is evident that this species is 

 distinct from any of the preceding. Its contour is more regular, oval, and elliptical tlian tliat of 

 the E. exinr and less regular than that of the E. nii}iiiis. The head is rather small, fusiform and 

 attenuated, and its vertical measurement through the eye proportionately less than in any other 

 species. Caudal fin emargiuato and falcate mure acutely than the Ealnr. The color of the back 

 greenish brown; sides lighter, but shaded with brown; underneath white. Total length 30 

 inches; head 7'^; vertical lino through the eye, from frontal surface to bottom of lower jaw 2% 

 inches. This species sometimes attains Sl}^ pounds wiiglit." 



■)■ "This is the fish that has just claims to the name of The Great Northern Tike, as there is 

 abundant and unquestionable testimony of enormous size, ranging from 40, 75, 80, and 110 

 pounds. The habitat of this fish is the waters of the Mississippi system, and it has been well 

 known since the earliest settlement of the West under various local names, as Chautauqua 

 Lake Pike, Alleghany River Pike, JIuskingum River Pike, Kentucky River I'ike, Rock River 

 (Illinois) Pike, and is now found in the greatest abundance and of the largest size, in the clear, 

 cold lakes of the Wisconsin and Minnesota pineries, at the heads of the tributaries of the Mis- 

 sissippi. In early days, bef ire the streams were rendered turbid by the washing of lands in cul- 

 tivation, this fish was more abundant in Lake Pepin than it now is, but a few are taken occa- 

 sionally. One of 75 ]iound8 was taken in those early days by reputable citizens still living at 

 Lake City. One of 40 pounds was taken two years ago by a man who fishes for the market, 

 and numbers have been taken ranging from 2 pounds to 20 pounds. This fish is generally found 

 either in these pinery streams or near the mouth of them in the Mississippi River." (General 

 Israel Garrard, in a letter dated Juno 1, 1886, Frontenac, Minnesota.) 



X Concerning the name to be given to this family Dr. Gill remarks : 



" In my ' Families and Subfamilies of Fishes ' (18'J3, No. 133) I have adopted Poeciliidx instead 

 of Cijprinodfinlidie for the family at present generally known by the latter name. 



" It ia quite true that Professor Agassiz was the first to recognize the family so called, but ho 

 simply gave the plural form of Ciipnnndr>iitfx,st.nA not a name with the patronymic suffix now 

 almost universally used to denote families, and he did not define it, but simply gave it to the 

 residuum left after defining the Ci/prim. Little later Bonaparte gave a regular family name 

 (Pieriliidn') derived from the earliest established name of a genus of the family and that name 

 was several times emploj-ed by him and others while the name Ciiprinodontes remained in abey- 

 ance ; he also regtilarly defined it. The first regular use of the latter name with a patronymic 

 suffix {Citprinndontidie) was by Sir John Richardson in 1856. 



" Another objection to the name Cyprinodonlidie which may reconcile us to its abandonment is 

 that it expresses a taxonomic falsehood and is even now constantly misleading persons. In the 

 part of the great ' New English Dictionary,' lately published (v. 2, p. 1306), a ' Ciiprinodnnl'' is 

 defined as 'a malacopterygious fish of the family Cuprmodontidie, of which the typical genus is 

 Cijprinodfin ; they differ from the Cyprinids in having the jaws more projecting and toothed.' 

 In the recent Manual of Moreau (1892, p. 479), the ' CypriiioJontides' and * Cyprinides' are 

 approximated in an analytical table and simply contrasted on account of the presence of jaw 

 teeth (' machoires dentees') in the former and the absence (machoires ' non dentees ' ) in the 

 latter. It certainly is time for trained ichthyologists to have learned that there is no affinity 

 between the two types, and that they differ so radically in all essential features of organization 

 that they should be referred to different orders. Yet Valenciennes, in the penultimate volume 

 of his great work (Hist. Nat. Poiss., xxi, p. 455), attempted to justify the retention of the 

 Cyprinixlonts in the same family with the Cyprinids and theirnatural allies. The Cyprinodonts 

 or Pieciliidsare really related to the Esocids and Umbrids, and to them they should be approxi- 

 mated in the suborder Haphmi. " (Gill, Proc. U. S. Nat. 5Ius., 1894, 115.) 



