MALACOPTERYGII ABDOMINALES. 227 



the branchiae, and the intestines differ but slightly from those of the 

 Trout. 



A. sphyrcBna, L., Cuv. j Mem. du Mus., I, xi. The only spe- 

 cies known; its natatory bladder is extremely thick, and singu- 

 larly loaded with that silvery substance (nacre) which is so 

 remarkable in fish: it is employed for colouring pearls. The 

 stomach is remarkable for its black colour.(l) From the Medi- 

 terranean. 

 Artedi and several of his successors have united all the Salmoni- 

 des, which have not more than four or five rays in the branchiae, in 

 the subgenus Characinus; but there is a sufficient difference in their 

 figure, and particularly in their teeth, to warrant a still greater sub- 

 division. They all, however, have the numerous caeca of the pre- 

 ceding Salmons, with the bladder of the Cyprinidae, which is divided 

 by a strangulation. The lingual teeth of the Trout are always 

 wanting. We subdivide them as follows: 



CuRiMATA, Cuv. 



The whole external form of a Thymallus; small mouth, the first 

 dorsal above the ventrals, &c. Some of them resemble certain 

 Thymalli in their teeth which are only visible with the glass, 

 and merely differ from them in the number of their branchial 

 rays.(2) 



Others have a range of teeth in each jaw, which are trenchant, 

 directed obliquely forwards, the anterior ones longest, and, in a word, 

 comparable to those of a Balistes.(3) From the rivers of South 

 America. 



(1) This fish, which is most certainly the Argentina of Willughby, 229, and 

 consequently that of Artedi and Linnaeus, always has a second adipose dorsal, as 

 was observed by Brunnich, Icth. mass., 79? it should therefore have been placed 

 among the Salmons. The Jlrgmt. machnata, Forsk., is the Elops saurus; this is 

 also, most probably, the case with the Argent. Carolina of Lin., although Catesby 

 has omitted the dorsal in the fig. cited, Car., II, xxiv. The Argentina of Grono- 

 vlus is an Anchovy, and that of Pennant a Scopelus, — Ser^jc of Risso. The Argent, 

 glossodonta, Forsk., is a particular genus, the Butirinus of Commerson. 



(2) Salmo edentulus, Bl., 380; — S. unimaculatus, Bl., 381, 3; — S. txniurus, Va- 

 len. App. Humb., Zool. Obs., II, p. 166; — S. curima, Cu.v., Marcgr., 156; — Curi- 

 mate Gilbert, Quoy et Gaym, Voy. de Freyc. Zool., pi. xlviii, f. 1; — and probably 

 S. cyprino'ides, Gronov., Zooph., No. 378. They are the Pacu, Spix, XXXVIII, 

 and XXXIX. His Anodus, XL and'XLI, only differs in the mouth, which is ra- 

 ther more cleft. 



(3) Salmo fasciatus, Bl., 379; — »S'. Friderlcii, Id., 378. 



