SS a. —-_— 
THE ZooLocist—AveustT, 1872. 3189 
given, but the leading naturalists I have mentioned preferred continuing in 
the belief that these creatures, although possessing so many ichthyic 
characters, were really reptiles, and not admissible into the class of fishes. 
A most luminous paper by Dr. Giinther, published at p. 257 of No. 44 of 
the ‘Popular Science Review,’ entirely confirms my views, and must, as 
I think, set the question finally at rest, and remove the three genera, 
Lepidosiren, Protopterus and Ceradotus from the class Reptilia, and place 
them in that of fishes. The following structural details are derived from 
Dr. Giinther’s paper:—The body is eel-shaped, but considerably shorter 
and thicker than the comnmon eel, and covered with very large scales; the 
head is almost entirely naked, flattened and broad; the mouth small, and 
provided with thick soft lips; there are no external nostrils. The anterior 
portion of the trunk is depressed, but soon passes into a compressed form, 
and terminates in a thin, pointed, tail, which is surrounded by a broad 
vertical fin, supported by influmerable fine cartilaginous rays: the creature 
has no other fins that can be properly so called, but four paddles, which 
remind one of those of the enalio-saurians: these are covered with small 
scales along the middle from the root to their extremity: they are flexible 
in eyery part, and in every direction, and are too feeble to assist in locomo- 
tion on land, but Dr. Giinther suggests they may be used when the animal 
crawls in water over the muddy bottom of a creek. The Burramunda is 
said to attain a weight of twenty pounds, and a length of six feet; but the 
largest specimen received at the Museum is about three feet and a half long. 
It appears to feed principally, if not entirely, on plants; Dr. Giinther found 
the intestinal canal crammed full of more or less masticated leaves of various 
plants belonging to the natural orders Myrtacee and Graminew; they had 
lost their green colour entirely, being of a uniformly deep black, as if they 
had lain in water for some time, and had been eaten in a decomposing 
condition. The quantity of these vegetables is enormous, and there is no 
doubt they constitute the principal food of the fish. Shells, fragments of 
which have been found in the stomach, Dr. Giinther thinks-may have 
been swallowed accidentally, but it has been stated repeatedly that the 
Burramunda can be taken with a hook baited with a worm.—E. Newman. 
Occurrence of the Bogue off Plymouth.—On the 26th of June a rare 
fish, which I recognized as the bogue (Sparus boops), was captured near 
Plymouth. There is a good figure of this species in Couch’s ‘ Fishes of the 
- British Islands’; he says, “ The first British example recorded was caught 
in a ground-sean, in company with gray mullets, in 1842, in the harbour of 
Falmouth, and which fortunately came into the hands of A. Fox, Esq., who 
caused a drawing to be taken, from which our figure is derived. The 
Specimen itself was preserved, and is now in the Museum of the Royal 
Cornwall Institution, Truro. Others have since been caught, and one 
presented to the British Museum by W. P. Cocks, Esq.”—J. Gatcombe. 
SECOND SERIES—YVOL. VII. 258 
