PREFACE. IX 



thyologist. They are taken for the most part from living specimens, and care- 

 fully colored on the spot. For those which are copied, due credit is given in the 

 text, and the twelve last plates are almost entirely of this character. Where 

 we have been unable to draw from a living specimen, and have been compelled 

 to make use of a cabinet specimen, we have given merely an outline. 



Exclusive of the fossil fishes, we enumerate in the work four hundred and forty 

 species, comprised under one hundred and fifty-six genera and thirty-two fami- 

 lies. Of these, two hundred and ninety-four species belonging to this State, or 

 the adjacent waters, are accompanied by detailed descriptions. In preparing 

 the following pages, we have endeavored to compress our descriptions within 

 the shortest possible compass consistent with clearness. Had this been the only 

 department entrusted to us, we should have dwelt more on the anatomical details, 

 and perhaps have been more diffuse on the habits and peculiarities of species. 

 Too little, however, is positively known of their habits, and that little is mixed 

 up with too much of the marvellous, to render it desirable or profitable to intro- 

 duce them here. When it is, moreover, recollected that we are to traverse 

 through the whole animal kingdom, we would fain indulge the hope that this 

 imperfect attempt to enlarge our acquaintance with a single class may be received 

 with a favor proportionate to the difficulties and extent of the task. 



J. E. DE KAY. 



The Locusts, Queens County. 

 July 1, 1842. 



