6 BULLETIN 188, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Bleeker (356) listed all the species of fishes actually known from Siam, 

 177 in number, including marine forms. 



Among the noteworthy Siamese fresh-water fishes described as new 

 by Bleeker are the catfish Eeterobagrus hocourti, the loach Botia 

 modesta, and the cyprinids Pimfius proctozysron and Paralauhuca 

 typus. 



A valuable early account of Siamese fishes appeared in 1866 under 

 the authorship of Firmin Bocourt in "Notes sur les reptiles, les 

 batraciens et les poissons recueillis pendant un voyage dans le royaume 

 de Siam," which formed a part of the general work by A. Milne- 

 Edwards on the expedition of Bocourt to Siam. It was in this article 

 that Bocourt described and fiom-ed the catfishes Pangmius larnaudii 

 and Micronema hleeheri^ now Kryptopterus hleekeri Giinther, and that 

 Bleeker was credited with Heterobagrus hocourti. 



Beginning in 1878 and continuing till 1883, H. E. Sauvage, of the 

 Paris Museum d'Histoire Naturelle, published a series of important 

 articles on the fresh-water fishes of Indo-China and of Siam, based 

 chiefly on collections made by Jullien and Harmand. A number of 

 new forms inhabiting Siam were described and figured, including four 

 catfishes {Hemipimelodus siamensis, Pangasius pleurotaenius^ Heli- 

 cophagus hypophthalmus, and Pseudeutropius siamensis [now Platy- 

 tropius siamensis]) and various cyprinids (among them Barilius or- 

 natus^ Cirrhinus microlepis, Cosmochilus harmandi, Proharbus juUieni, 

 and Puntius siamensis). Of special interest and importance is the 

 paper "Sur une collection de poissons recueillie dans le Me-Nam 

 (Siam) par M. Harmand" (1883b), listing 70 species, some new, some 

 recorded from Siam for the first time. It is in this paper by Sauvage 

 that there occurs one of the most curious lapses in the whole history 

 of ichthyology. A catfish, Pseudohagrus nudiceps^ is described as 

 new. In the same publication and on immediately preceding pages, 

 Sauvage (1883a) had a paper entitled "Sur une collection de poissons 

 recueillie dans le lac Biwako, (Japon) par M. F. Steenackers," in 

 which, in language practically identical with that used in the Siamese 

 paper, he described as new, obviously from the same specimen or speci- 

 mens, a catfish under the name Pseudohagrus nudiceps. This species 

 certainly does not exist in Siam, and the genus has no known repre- 

 sentative south of China. 



Under the auspices of the University of Edinburgh and the Uni- 

 versity of Liverpool, Nelson Annandale and Herbert C. Kobinson made 

 an expedition to Perak and the Siamese Malay States in 1901-2, the 

 results of which were published under the title "Fasciculi Malayenses." 

 In part 2 of the section devoted to zoology, James Johnstone contrib- 

 uted a "Keport on the Marine Fishes" containing a description of one 

 supposed new goby {Periophthalmus phya) from the estuaries of the 



