SCIENTIFIC HISTORY OF THE BLACK BASS. 25 



The description of CaUiurus punctulatus, however, it has been 

 thought by Prof. Agassiz, was based on a form of the sunfish type 

 with large mouth. But such could not have been the case, as is quite 

 evident from the armature of the operculum ("opercule with an 

 acute and membranaceous appendage, before which stands a flat 

 spine"}, the contour of the dorsal (" depressed in the middle"), and 

 above all the number of the rays of that fin ("dorsal fin yellow with 

 twenty-four rays, of which ten are spiny"); in all these respects (as 

 well as others), the description is inapplicable to a Pomotid and only 

 applicable to a Micropterus. 



A couple of years later (in 1822), a much more reliable natural- 

 ist* published descriptions of five supposed new species of the genus 

 Cichla of Bloch (as supposed to have been adopted by Cuvier). All 

 except one (C. cenea = Ambloplites rupestris) really belong to the 

 genus Micropterus, and all the northern forms (C.fasciata, C. ohiensis, 

 C. minima), as is evident from the allusions to the number of rays, 

 aq (tarnation, or size of mouth, belong to the small-mouthed type, 

 while the description of the Floridian species (C. floridana) is as ap- 

 plicable to the same as to the large-mouthed type. The descriptions 

 are not sufficiently contrasted, and are too general and therefore 

 vague ; nor, on comparison with specimens, are the differences sug- 

 gested by the mention of characters in one case and their neglect in 

 another apparent. As no reference was made to the forms of the 

 same type previously described, although the author was doubtless 

 acquainted with Rafinesque's memoir, it is presumable that the neg- 

 lect Avas intentional (and doubtless provoked by the character of that 

 author's work) and not without strong suspicion that the species 

 named had already, perhaps, received designations, but with unrec- 

 ognizable descriptions. 



In the great " Histoire Naturelle des Poissons,"f Cuvier and 

 Valenciennes described the two species of the genus, but, deceived 

 by the state of their specimens in one case at least (Huro nigricans), 



*LE SUEUR (Charles A. . . ). Descriptions of the [sic] five new species of 

 the genus Cichla of Cuvier. By C. A. Le Sueur. Read June 11, 1822. jour- 

 nal of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia. Vol. ii, Part i. 



Philadelphia, 1821. [Pp. 214-221]. 



f CUVIETI (Georges Chretien Leopold Dagobert baron] and Achille VALEN- 

 CIENNES. Histoire Xaturelle des Poissons, .... Paris, .... 1828-1849. [t, ii, 

 182S, pp. 124-126 ; t. iii, 1829, pp. 54-58]. 

 3 



