200 PISCES. 



where it has been excessively multiplied, on account of the splen- 

 dour and variety of its colours. 



Cyp. auratus, L., Bl., 93. (The Golden Carp.) Dorsal and 

 anal spines dentated as in the Common Carp. This fish is at first 

 blackish and by degrees assumes that splendid golden red 

 which characterizes it; some, however, are of a silver colour, 

 and others again are marked by various shades of the three 

 colours. Individuals are found without a dorsal, others have 

 a very small one; the caudal of a third is very large and is di- 

 vided into three or four lobes; the eyes of a fourth are exces- 

 sively distended; all these accidental changes, which are the 

 result of domestication, may be variously combined.(l) 

 To this group also belongs the smallest of the European Carps, 

 Cypr. amarics, BL, VIII, 3; La Bouvi6re^ or Peteuse. An 

 inch long; greenish above; of a fine pale yellow beneath; in the 

 spawning season, in April, there is a steel-blue line on each 

 side of the tail; the second dorsal ray forms a tolerably rigid 

 spine. 



Barbus, Cuv. 



The dorsal and anal short; the second or third ray of the dorsal 

 formed by a stout spine; four cirri, two on the end of the upper jaw 

 and two at its angles. 



B. vulgaris; Cyprinus barbus, L., Bl., 18. (The Barbel.) 

 Known by its oblong head; common in clear streams and fish- 

 ponds, where it is sometimes found ten feet in length. 



B. caninus, Bonnelli; B. plebeius, Val., B. cgues, Id. (2), 



(1) Such are the Cj/pr. macrophtalmus, BL, 410, or the gros yeux, Lacep., V, 

 xviii, 2, the C. quatre hbes, Lacep., lb., 3, and the varieties of the Gold-fish, IJl., 

 93, 94, &c. See Cvlledion des Dorades de la Chine, Sauvigny et Martinet. Add: 

 Cypr., devarid., Buch., pi. vi, f. 94; — C. catla. Id., pi. xiii, f. 81. 



(2) Add the Barbels of the Casjiian sea: Cyp. mursa, Guldenst., Nov. Comm. 

 Petrop., XVII, pi. xviii, f. 3, 5;—C. bulatmai. Pall., and the Barbel of the Nile; 

 Cyp. binny, Forsk., 71; Sonnini, pi. xxvii, f. 3, or Cyp. lepidotus, Geoff., Eg., 

 Poiss. du Nil., pi. X, f. 2. 



N.B. Bruce, after giving the history of the true Binny, applies to it, through a 

 mistake, the figure and description of a Polyntmus, which he must have taken in 

 the Red Sea; hence the ideal species Polyntmus niloticus, Shaw. 



Barbels are also found in India: such are, Cypr. calbasu, Buch., Fishes of the 

 Ganges, pi. 11; f. 33;— C cocsa, Id., pi. iii, f 77;— C. Daniconius, Id. XV, 89;— 

 C. kunama, Russ., 204;— C. raorw/a, Buch., XVIII, 9h—C.gmius, lb., IV, 82;— 

 C. Rohita, lb., XXXVI, 85, and several others to be described in our Icthyology; 

 they are also found in America. 



