17S Prof. Agassi z on a New Classification of Fishes, <^c. 



the most ancient fish. Another observation worthy of attention 

 is that we do not find fish decidedly carnivorous before the car- 

 boniferous series ; that is to say, fish provided with large conical 

 and pointed teeth. The other fish of the secondary series before 

 the chalk appear to have been omnivorous, their teeth being 

 either rounded, or in obtuse cones, or hke a brush. 



The discovery of coprolites containing very perfect scales of 

 fish which had been eaten, permit us to recognise the organized 

 beino-s which formed the food of many ancient fish ; even the 

 intestines, and in some fossil fish of the chalk, the whole stomach 

 is preserved, with its different membranes. In a great number 

 of fish from Sheppey, the chalk and the oolite series, the capsule 

 of the bulb of the eye is still uninjured ; and in many species 

 from Monte Bolca, Solenhofen, and the lias, we see distinctly 

 all the little blades which form the branchiae. 



It is in the series of deposits below the lias, that we begin 

 to find the largest of those enormous sauroid fish whose osteo- 

 logy recalls, in many respects, the skeletons of saurians, both by 

 the closer sutures of the bones of the skull, their large conical 

 teeth, striated longitudinally, and the manner in which the spi- 

 nous processes are articulated with the body of the vertebra?, 

 and the ribs at the extremity of the spinous processes. 



The small number of fish yet known in the transition forma- 

 tions, does not as yet permit the author to assign to them a pe- 

 culiar character, nor has he discovered in the fossil fish of strata 

 below the greensand, any differences corresponding with those 

 now observed between marine and fresh water fish, so that he 

 cannot, on ichthyological data, decide on the fresh water or ma- 

 rine origin of the ancient groups. 



Prodromus Floret. Peninsultt India. Orientalis. By Robert 

 Wight, M. D., F.L.S., &c. and G. A. Walker- Arnott, 

 A. M., F. L. S., &c. &c. Vol. I. 



Much as has been done of late years to elucidate the botany 

 of our Indian possessions, far more remains behind to reward 

 the researches of such men as Wallich, Wight, and Royle. It 

 is gratifying to see them returning to Europe for a season, and 

 devoting their leisure to the publication of their observations. 



