16 THE CYPRINODONTS. 



de cette famille tous les genres qui, dans le regne animal de Cuvier, suivent 

 les Loches propreraent dites, savoir les Anabk/>s, les Pcedlia, les Lehias, les 

 Funclulus, les Molinesia et les Cyprinodon, pour en faire une petite famille §, 

 part, sous le nom de Ci/2^rhiodontes." To this family he refers again in 1839, 

 in 1844, and in 1854. It was adopted by Mliller, 1843 and 1846, Miiller and 

 Troschel, 1848, Gill, 1856, Poey, 1858, Kner and Steindachner, 1865, Fitz- 

 inger, 1873, and others, under the name first given, and under the form 

 CyprinodontidfB, its adoption has been pretty near general. Valenciennes, 

 1846, retained Cuvier's name Cyprino'ides, without separating the families 

 and was imitated by Poey, 1855, with the orthography Cyprinoidei and 

 Cyprinoidea. Owen, 1846, renders the name Cyprinodontidte, mentioning 

 " Umber " as the type, and this form of the title has been somewhat gen- 

 erally accepted, but with the exclusion of the Umbridae. Swainson, 1839, 

 divided the Cyprinidre and put his Cyprina3 in the Salmonidse as a sub- 

 family, while he raised the remainder to family rank as the Cobitidge with 

 three sub-families, Cobitinse, Anablepidge, and Poecilinae. McClelland, 1839, 

 has in his family Cyprinidje, what he calls " a small group " containing PiB- 

 cilia, Lebias, Aplocheilus, Fundiilus, Molinesia, and Cyprinodon. MacLeay, 

 1842, placed the Poecilianos, Cobitinse, and PlatycarinjB in his Apalopterinoe, 

 a division of the Cyprinidas. Bleeker, 1859, divides his Cyprinodontoidei 

 into Cyprinodontini, Aplocheilini, Orestiasini, and Anablepini. In 1863, the 

 family became Cyprinodontoides, the sub-families Cyprinodontiformes, with 

 stirps Tellianini, Cyprinodontini, and Belonesocini, and Aplochciliformes, with 

 stirps Orestiasiformes and Anablepiformes. Gill, 1856, adopted the Cyprino- 

 dontes ; in 1861, his family became the Cyprinodontoidae, with sub-families 

 Cyprinodontina3 and Hydrargyrinse ; in 1865 he took up Poeciliidae, as from 

 Bonaparte ; in 1872 he grouped together the Esocidae, Umbridse, and Cypri- 

 nodontidte under the name Cyprinodontoidea ; and in 1894, ignoring the 

 fact that it was preoccupied in insects, he again prefers Poeciliidae. This 

 last, or his Cyprinodontidte of -1872, is the equivalent of the Cyprinodontidte 

 of Giinther and later authors. Giinther, 1866, subdivides the Cyprinodon- 

 tidae into Cyprinodontidce carnivorce, containing the Cyprinodontina, the Fun- 

 dulina, Jenynsiina, and the Anablepina, and the Cyprinodontidce limnophagm, 

 including such genera as are here placed in the Poeciliinag. 



In the present writing the characters and contents of the family and of 

 the genera vary somewhat from those of other authors, as is indicated in the 

 synopsis below. Though the structure of the eye, of the anal fin and of 



