+cat ena ee 
L. Agassiz on the Ichthyological Fauna of Western America. 77 
the most elongated of the four species, and its snout is most 
prominent. Valenciennes states that C. Cyprinus occurs also in 
ke Pontchartrain, Louisiana; but this is incorrect.- He has 
mistaken my C. T'aurus, which belongs to the genus Bubalich- 
thys, for the true Cyprinus of Lesueur. This result shows how 
important it is in identifying fishes from distinct water basins, not 
to trust implicitly to descriptions for comparison, but to resort as 
far as possible to original specimens. 1 shall have full opportu- 
nity below to show also how dangerous it may be to take for 
granted that because fishes occur in distant regions, they must 
differ specifically, and to describe them as such. 
Whether Carpiodes tumidus, B. and G., from Texas, belongs 
to this or the following genus, or to Ichthyobus, I am unable to 
ascertain from the description published by Messrs. Baird and 
Girard in the Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences in 
Philadelphia, 1854, p. 28. 
am entirely at a loss to understand why Rafinesque should 
have referred his Catostomus xanthopus with C. Cyprinus and 
Velifer to his subgenus Carpiodes. It certainly does not belong to 
the same genus as the description shows, in which the dorsal is 
said to be “hardly faleate with 14 rays,’ Ihave scarcely any 
doubt that Rafinesque had an old specimen of Lesueur’s Catos- 
tomus nigricans before him when he described his Cat. rantho- 
even as far as Osage Rive 
ees Mr. George Stolley, and also in the middle Atlantic 
tates. 
Bubalichthys, Agass. 
At the time I vindicated the propriety of restoring some of the 
genera established by Rafinesque among Cyprinoids,* I did not 
Suspect that the genus Carpiodes as I then represented it, still con- 
tained two distinct types, though I had noticed that some of the 
Species had the anterior margin of their dorsal greatly prolonged, 
Whilst in others it hardly rises above the middle and posterior 
Portion of that fin. Having since examined the pharyngeals of 
all the species of this tribe which I have been able to secure from 
different parts of the country, I find that those with a high dor- 
sal, which constitute the genus Carpiodes proper, have in addi- 
ton Very thin flat pharyngeals with extremely mitute teeth, 
Whilst those with a low dorsal have triangular pharyngeals with 
* See this Journal 2nd Ser., vol. xvii, page 353. 
