CLASS XIV. 



FISHES (PISCES) 1 . 



THE Fishes are vertebrate cold-blooded animals, which live in 

 water, and breathe by gills. Their external form is very various, 

 yet in their internal structure there is still a correspondence suf- 

 ficient for regarding the class of fishes as a natural division of the 

 animal kingdom. LINNAEUS and BRISSON, at the beginning of the 

 preceding century, separated from it the cetaceous animals, which, 

 in the first edition of the Systema Naturce, the great Swedish 

 Naturalist had arranged with the fishes, although ARISTOTELES had 

 already regarded the fishes and cetaceans as two large distinct 

 genera or classes, adducing the gills as a special characteristic of 

 fishes, which, moreover, as he sagaciously remarked, differ by the 



1 On the class of fishes may be consulted amongst other works : 



P. BELONII De Aquatilibus Libri n. Parisiis, 1553 (forma oblonga). 



H. SALVIANI Aquatilium Animalium Historia. Romae, 1553, folio. 



G. RONDELETII De Piscibus marinis. Lugduni, 1554, folio. 



G. WILLUGBEJI Historia Piscium, cura J. RAJI et C. MORTIMERI. Londini, 1743, 

 folio. 



P. ARTEDI Ichthyologia, s. opera omnia de Piscibus posthuma, edidit C. LINN.EUS. 

 L. B. 1738, 8vo. 



M. E. BLOCK (ETconomuche NaturgescTiichte der Fische Deutschlands. Berlin, 1782, 

 1784, in. Bd. 4to (with col. plates in folio). 



M. E. BLOCH Ichthyologie ou Histoire naturelle generate et particuliere des Poissons. 

 Berlin, 1787 1797, xn. Vol. fol. (with 432 coloured plates). 



BLOCH Systema IcUhyologice, edidit J. G. SCHNEIDER, 1801, 8vo, r Vol. (with 

 no, mostly coloured, plates). 



LACEPEDE Hist, naturelle des Poissons. Paris, 1798 to 1803, 4to, v. Vol. (also 

 in small 8vo, XI. parts, with many figures). 



CUVIER and VALENCIENNES Histoire naturelle des Poissons. Paris, 1828 1849, 

 22 Vols. (8vo or 4to) with 650 plates, coloured or un coloured. The whole contains 

 the Acanihopterygii and Malacopterygii abdominales. VALENCIENNES has undertaken 

 a second series on the remaining Malacopterygii and the Chondropterygii. 



On the anatomy of fishes, besides the work last cited, in which the internal structure 

 of this class is illustrated by many figures from the river Perch, compare : 



A. MONRO The Structure and Physiology of Fishes explained and compared with 

 those of Man and other Animals. Edinburgh, 1785, fol. 



R. OWEN Lectures on the Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of the Vertebrate 

 Animals. Part I. Fishes. London, 1846, 8vo. 



Special works on the fishes of particular countries and writings on different points 

 of the anatomy of these animals will be cited now and then in the sequel. 



