128 
Aquatic Lite 
Aquatilium animatum historia. It was 
published in Rome, and at once came to 
be an authority on the subject of which 
it treated. Little regard, however, is evi- 
denced for the value of specific charac- 
ters in any of the figures on the 76 plates 
of the work, in which 92 forms of fish 
are described. In fact, the work of this 
able writer was more or less popular in 
style; and while it very materially ad- 
vanced the science of ichthyology, in a 
way it, or rather its author, did not resort 
to technical description—a feature so 
conspicuous in the case of Belon who 
preceded him, or as did the better in- 
formed writers on the subject who were 
his contemporaries. Rondelet, for ex- 
ample (1507-57), was a far more scien- 
tific man than Salviani, for he not only 
graduated as a doctor of medicine in 
Paris, but he passed subsequently 
through a thorough course in anatomy 
under competent instructors. Still, as in 
the case of all his predecessors in ich- 
thyology, Rondelet failed to grasp the 
true principles of taxonomy; indeed, 
throughout his two great works he em- 
ployed the terms “genus’” and “species” 
synonomously. In 1554 appeared his 
Libri de piscibus marinis, and during the 
following year his more formal produc- 
tion, Universae aquatilium Iustoriae pars 
altera, both being published at Lyons. 
Here we find some 197 marine and 47 
fresh water species described, all, with 
but few exceptions, being from European 
waters—in fact, a large percentage was 
from the Mediterranean Sea. 
Rondelet’s productions were an im- 
provement upon those of Belon’s in sev- 
eral respects, but more particularly in the 
matter of the accuracy of his pictorial 
work. It was distinctly his aim to pre- 
sent as attractively as possible all that 
was known about every form he under- 
took to describe. As a consequence his 
work, as a whole, taken in connection 
with that of Belon’s, became the stand- 
ard ichthyological treatises of the day; 
indeed, for upwards of a century they 
continued to hold such a place in scien- 
tific literature. 
During this long period in history, 
however, no little attention was paid, 
from time to time, to the study of fishes. 
These investigations were even carried 
to New World forms, and especially 
those of the American tropics. Among 
the principal contributions to the science 
were Marcgrave and Piso; Malpighi de- 
voted himself to the nervous system, and 
Swammerdam to the digestive system. 
Finally the respiratory apparatus in 
fishes was more or less systematically 
studied by Duverney. 
By this time the skeleton in many 
forms was more or less known, so that 
the bones in the more unusual types could 
all be named and their relations and 
articulations understood. So true was 
this that even as odd a form, osteologi- 
cally, as a file-fish (Monocanthus his- 
pidus), shown.in the accompanying cut, 
was, in all probability, fully compre- 
hended by ichthyologists. The specimen 
here shown was prepared by the writer 
many years ago at the New York Aqua- 
rium; it was taken in Bermudan waters, 
and was for a long time on exhibition in 
one of the tanks of that famous institu- 
tion. 
Ichthyology received an enormous im- 
vetus from about 1648 to 1730, during 
which era such astute naturalists as Ray, 
Willughby and Artedi came into the field. 
The science received rich additions from 
their several pens; and for the first time 
in zoological literature the true meaning 
of a “species” was fully defined. Then, 
too, the natural affinities of animals was 
better understood, their affinities being 
(Continued on page 137.) 
