i82 OUTLINES OF ICHTHYOLOGY. 



sportsman takes cognizance, its importance is evi- 

 dent. The spiny-finned fishes contain fifteen 

 Families, but no great subordinate divisions. The 

 soft-finned fish, on the contrary, are divided into 

 three strongly-marked Orders founded upon the 

 position, or absence, of the ventral fins ; and 

 to the first of these malacopterygii abdominales 

 belong the whole of our soft-finned sporting 

 fish. 



The division in which any fish is to be classed 

 having been thus decided, it remains only to deter- 

 mine its family and species. 



As regards family no difficulty whatever can be 

 experienced, there being only four families in all 

 to which it can belong, and these being clearly re- 

 cognizable by the most obvious signs. 



To commence with the spiny-finned fishes : 

 All the sporting fish of this order belong to one 

 Family, the Percidczofi. which the Perch is the 

 type ; whilst those having soft fins are embraced 

 in three families : the Cyprinidtz, of which the 

 Carp is the type ; the Esocidtz, of which the Pike 

 is the type ; and the Salmonidce, of which the 

 Salmon is the type. In regard to these families, 

 again, no difficulty can be found, every species of 

 the Salmon possessing the peculiar characteristic 

 of two back fins, and no other species of the same 

 Order more than one, the Pike, of which we have 

 only a single variety, being totally dissimilar from 

 every other family, and the remaining species 



