520 PROCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM vol. 83 



To return to the chronological arrangement of the post-Linnaean 

 authors, we next take up Schinz.^'^ The account of the seahorses 

 by this author, wliich was neglected by most later \mters, is as 

 follows, in full: 



"Das Seepfcrdchen, Hyppocampus brevirostris./Syngnath. hip- 

 pocampus. Bl. 109. F. 3./Der Rumpf sieben, der Schwanz viereckig, 

 der Riissel vollkommen walzenformig, weiss punktirt. Im Mittelmeer 

 und andern Meeren**)." In a footnote, as indicated, he adds, 

 "**Hyppocamp. longirostris. Will. I. 25. F. 4. Beide arten haben 

 nur einige Muskelfasern am Korper." 



Evidently Scliinz merely supplied names to the two species found 

 in "nos mers", as difierentiated by Cuvier (1817), although the local- 

 ity Schinz gives is somewhat different from that given by Cuvier, 

 "Mittelmeer und andern Meeren" instead of "nos mers." There is 

 no question as to the disposition of Schinz 's name brevirostris . Since 

 he cites S. hippocampus in the synonymy of that species, he evidently 

 substituted brevirostris for hippocampus to avoid tautonymy. There- 

 fore, Schinz's bretirostris must be suppressed as a synonym of hip- 

 pocampus. The latter name is thus restricted by Schinz to a short- 

 snouted species, and since it was previously restricted by Leach to a 

 Mediterranean species, it must be used for the common short-snouted 

 Mediterranean seahorse, a conclusion to which we previously arrived 

 (p. 518). 



There may be some question as to the disposition of the name 

 longirostris. Did Scliinz intend to apply the locality "Mittelmeer 

 und andern Meeren" to brevirostris only, or to longirostris as well? 

 And if the latter is answered affirmatively, did Scliinz intend to 

 include all long-snouted seahorses in one species, or to apply longi- 

 rostris only to those found in French waters? It is futile, however, to 

 speculate now regarding his intention. The question must be de- 

 termined by the available evidence. Schinz's work is virtually a 

 translation, or at least a rendering closely following that of Cuvier 

 (1817), including the account of the seahorses, with the exception 

 noted in the preceding paragraph. The chief characters that Cuvier 

 used to distinguish his two species are now employed by Schinz to 

 coin the Latin names of those species. Schinz, as well as Cuvier, 

 cites Willughby's figure 4, and that figure, outside the structural 

 character implied in Schinz's name, is practically the sole basis of 

 liis longirostris. Schinz's account, therefore, is virtually based on 

 that of Cuvier, and the name longirostris must be applied to a species 

 from "nos mers" or to a long-snouted seahorse occurring in French 

 waters. It will be shown hereafter that the long-snouted seahorses 

 on the coasts of France consist of two subspecies, one in the Atlantic 

 and another in the Mediterranean, and it becomes necessary further 



" Das Thierreich von Cuvier, vol. 2, p. 262, 1822. 



