40 CONTRIBUTIONS TO NORTH AMERICAN ICHTHYOLOGY II. 



24 XENOTIS LYTHROCHLORIS. 



Iclhelis aurita, Raf., Icbtbyologia obiensis, 1820 (not Ldbrus miritus l,mn. ; not Le- 

 pomis aurilus Raf., 1819). 

 Lepomis auritiis, Cope, Journ. Acad. Nat. Sci. Pbila. 1868 (not Lepomis anritus Gill). 

 Ichthelis sangmnolentus, Jordan, Man. Vert. 1876 (in part, confounded with X.rnegalotis 



and X. sanguinolentus.) 

 Xenotis lythrochloris, Jordan (1877), Bull. U. S. Nat. Mus. ix, — . 



This elegant species is fairly described by Eafiuesque, and quite ac- 

 curately by Prof. Cope, but no other writers seem to have distinguished 

 it. It does not seem best to retiain the name auritus. Rafinesque ap- 

 parently took this species for the Linnean auritus, and, if so, this is 

 simply a case of mistaken identification, and the name thus given in 

 error should not be retained. If we suppose that Rafinesque intended 

 to describe his aurita as a new species, we have the anomalous case of' 

 an author describing a new species under the specific name borne by an 

 old species which he himself elsewhere precisely indicates as the typo 

 of his genus. In this view, which would be absurd in regard to any 

 author other than Rafinesque, we should have two species, strongly 

 resembling each other, in closely related genera, both bearing the same 

 specific name, Lepiopomus auritus and Xenotis auritus. This undesira- 

 ble arrangement we can avoid by supposing, what is probably the fact, 

 that Rafinesque wrongly identified his Icthelis aurita with Lahrus auri- 

 tus of Liunieus. Rafinesque's aurita being thus without a specific name, 



