306 KlsHtS. 



flattened more or less, is suspended to the bone (No. 48), which I 

 have just compared to tlie liuraerus.* 



This stylet proceeds downwards along the side of the body, behind 

 the pectoral fin, and is prolonged more or less forwards into the flesh, 

 so as to be taken for the analogue of the clavicle ; but it is directed 

 behind and seems to be rather a representative of the coracoid than 

 of any other bone, for it is lost ;.s it were in the flesh, having no 

 large sternum to rest upon as its support, such as is seen in the birds 

 and reptiles. Sometimes we find it joined to that on the other side, 

 and even in the genus siganus,f and that of seserinus it is very strong, 

 and reaches the origin of the anal fin. 



An e([ually curious arrangement is that of the genus batrachus, in 

 which the superior piece passes beyond the humerus above, and 

 becomes attached to the upper part of the spinous apophysis of the 

 first vertebra. 



In the cyprins, on the contrary, the stylet is degenerated to a thin 

 bene of a single piece, and it is wanted altogether in the eels, the sea 

 wolves, and the silures. J 



Bones of the Carpus. 



The little flat bones in fishes, which have been compared to the 

 carpus (No. 64), adhere to the outside border of the fourth and fifth 

 bones, which I have just called radius and ulna (Nos. 51, 52) ; they 

 usually form a single roAV, and never exceed the number of four or 

 five ;§ but sometimes they are so shrunk in the middle that they look 

 like two rows. Their office is to support the rays of the pectoral 

 (No. 65), however numerous the latter may be, but with the excep- 

 tion of the first (No. QQ), which is articulated immediately to the 

 superior bene of the arm, or the radius (No. 52). 



it is then the bones of the carpus, and not those of the arm, or fore 



* I believe tliat I was the first to speak of this stylet, in my Lecture ou Com- 

 parative Anatomy, p. 333. M. Geoffrey (Annales du Museum, vol. IX. p. 364) 

 had compared it to half the fourchette of birds, the latter being, as I have proved it 

 to be, their tme clavicle, and my opinion is adopted by the greater number of 

 anatomists. Still it is evident that it is altogether inconsistent with the position of 

 this piece behind ; indeed M. Geoffroy has corrected his opinion, and now calls it, in 

 his Philosophic Anatomique, the coracoid bone ; but he has not observed that it is 

 almost always composed of two pieces. M. Bakker has been equally inattentive to 

 this fact, although he concurs with us in the name of the bone; M. Van-der-Hoeven, 

 on the shoulder bone, is contented with making an extract from M. Geoffroy. 



f For this interesting observation we are indebted to M. Geoffroy. 



+ M. Geoffroy supposes that he discovered the stylet in the first rayof the pectoral 

 in the silures, that very ray which is spinous, and is actually united to the radius by 

 a most singular articulation, described by us elsewhere. There is, however, no 

 diinculty whatever in demonstrating, as we shall do in treating of this genus, that 

 ■ this is nothing more than a ray, and even an articulated ray, and which would 

 appear to be spinous only because its articulations are soldered together. The little 

 bone, again, which he considers as the analogue of the stylet in siluriis electricus, 

 is nothing else than the third bone of the fore arm, of which we have spoken in the 

 preceding page. 



§ M. Van-der-Koeven, page 67, according to M. Geoffroy, Annales du Mus. 

 vol. IX. p. 365 — .".68, states, that the bones of the carpus are wanted iu certain 

 tishes, or arc confounded in them with those of the rays. I do not think that this 

 cccuis in any osseous fish whatever. 



