286 PROCEEDINGS OF UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



diameter of the e3'e. Tke length of the lower jaw and that of the post- 

 orbital portion of the head are equal. There is a black lateral band 

 following the course of the lateral line and continued around the nose, 

 most distinct in the young specimen. 

 United States National Museum, 

 Washington^ December 18, 1879. 



DE^^CRIPTIOIV OF A ViE%V SPECIES OF A7IIIJBUS (A. PONOFROSV8) 

 FROm THE MISSISSIPPI RIVFR. 



By TAKLETON H. B£A]\. 



The United States National Museum received from Dr. J. G. W. 

 Steedman, of Saint Louis, Mo., chairman of the Missouri Fish Commis- 

 sion, on the 8th of November, 1879, a Catfish which weighed 150 pounds 

 at the time of shipment. After comparing this with the other described 

 species of Amiurus I am unable to identify it with any of them. The 

 most distinguishing character of the species is its many-rayed anal, in 

 which it resembles IcMhcelurus rather than Amiurus, though it has the 

 skull-structure of the latter. 



The specimen which forms the type of the present description was 

 sent at the re(iuest of Prof. Spencer F. Baird, United States Commis- 

 sioner of Fish and Fisheries, to whom Dr. Steedman wrote the follow- 

 ing information : "Your letter requesting the shipment to you of a large 

 Mississippi Catfish was received this morning. Upon visiting our 

 market this P. M. I luckily found two — one of 144 lbs., the other 150 

 lbs. The latter I ship to you to-night by express. ... I ])urchased 

 it from an old fish-dealer of 30 years' experience in our market; and he 

 assures me that the largest Mississippi Catfish he has met in that time 

 weighed 198 pounds. (He says he has heard of Catfish weighing 250 

 and 300 pounds, but he does not believe the stories.) This is the only 

 variety, he says, which reaches 100 lbs. There is another species which 

 sometimes attains 65 lbs. in weight. My informant (and he is practical 

 authority among us) enumerates six well-marked varieties of Catfish in 

 the Mississippi waters " 



The admission of this species into the genus Amiurus will necessitate 

 a modification of the definition of the genus so far as the limits of varia- 

 tion in the anal rays are concerned; and will leave only the lack of con- 

 tiguity between the supra-occipital and the second interspinal to dis- 

 tinguish Amiurus from Ichthcelurus. A plaster cast and the skeleton of 

 the type are preserved. 



Description. — The catalogue number of the type is 23388; its 

 length, to the origin of the midtUe caudal rays, is 57.2 inches, to the end 

 of the same rays, 61 inches. The distance from the middle of the base 

 of the caudal to the end of the upper caudal lobe is 8 inches. 



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