THE ANNALS 



AND 



MAGAZINE OF NATURAL HISTOEY. 



[SEVENTH SERIES.] 

 No. 75. MARCH 1904. 



XIX. — A Synopsis of the Suborders and Families of 

 Teleostean Fishes. By G. A. Boulenger, F.R S. 



For several years I have been endeavour i rig to improve the 

 classification of Teleostean Fishes, chiefly through a study of 

 their skeletons, of which a large series has been prepared in 

 the British Museum ; and Dr. A. Smith Woodward has 

 recently published his views on the arrangement of the fossil 

 types of this order. The time has come to gather together 

 the information thus obtained. The synopsis here offered was 

 prepared two years ago for the fish-volume of the ' Cambridge 

 Natural History,' but owing to circumstances over which I 

 have had no control its publication in that work is still further 

 delayed. Several important changes to my original scheme 

 have been made during this lapse of time, owing to the work 

 carried on in America by Drs. Gill, Jordan, and Starks, and 

 in this country by my young colleague Mr. 0. Tate Regan, 

 whose criticisms on many points I gratefully acknowledge. 



I need hardly say that I regard this new arrangement of 

 an enormous and most difficult group, including close upon 

 12,000 species, as merely provisional, and I am fully aware 

 that not a few groupings are nothing but card castles, which 

 future investigations are likely to upset. But my aim has 

 been to build up on phylogenetic lines, and as such I sincerely 

 trust my attempt will be found a considerable improvement 

 on the previous systems and serve as a basis for criticism. 



Ann. cD Mag. N. Hist. Ser. 7. Vol. xiii. 11 



