GUJs'TnER's CATALOGUE OP FTSHES. 19 



ticular branches it may be rivalled, and perhaps even excelled by- 

 some of the Continental and American collections. 



In the year 18^3 Dr. Grray obtained the sanction of the Trustees 

 of the British Museum to the publication of catalogues of certain 

 portions of the Zoological collection. These were at first merely 

 systematic lists of the specimens of animals belonging to the different 

 species of the groups to which they referred, with indications of the 

 locality from which they had been obtained, and of the mode in 

 which they had been acquired for the collection. But the plan has 

 been gradually extended, until from mere lists of the specimens 

 in the Museum many of these catalogues have become elaborate 

 treatises on different groups of animals, including not only the 

 species represented in the Museum collection, but also all others 

 known to science, and constituting in fact what are termed com- 

 plete Monographs of the subject. Some of the lately issued 

 catalogues, such as that of the Tortoises, by Dr. Gray himself, and 

 that of the Lantern- flies (Phasmidas), by Professor "Westwood, are 

 elaborately illustrated, and form the most recent and generally- 

 referred-to standard works on the subjects to which they relate. 



Dr. Giinther's above-named contribution to this series, of which 

 five volumes are now complete, is of a still more important nature 

 than those we have last mentioned. Although commenced simply 

 as a catalogue of the " xlcanthopterygian" Fishes in the British 

 Museum, the limits of this great division of the class Pisces have 

 already been passed, and, if the author is permitted to complete his 

 work, we believe it is intended that the whole of this numerous and 

 imperfectly known division of the Vertebrates shall be treated of in 

 the same manner. And although the simple term ''catalogue" is 

 used in its title. Dr. G-iinther's work would be more Mrly described 

 by a much more important name. So far from confining himself to 

 a mere enumeration of the specimens of fishes in the collection of 

 the British Museum, Dr. Giinther follows the lead of Dr. Gray and 

 the other authors of the more extended catalogues, and gives 

 descriptions of all the known species of each genus, whether they are 

 foimd in the British Museum or are known to exist in some other 

 collection. Diagnoses of the genera and higher groups are also 

 included, so as to render the so-called " Catalogue," a complete 

 treatise on general Ichthyology. In relation to this Dr. Giinther well 

 remarks in the preface to his first volume, that the number of kno-wn 

 species of fishes having been considerably increased of late years, 



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