I 



TBANSACTIONS OF SECTION D. DEPT. ZOOLOGY ANd]^BOTANY. 595 



Delle Cbiaie's and Batucbin's law has thus proved the means of solving a zoological 

 puzzle of a hundred years' standing ; and surely this result may serve to recommend 

 it to the attention of those interested in this subject. 



I have been so fortunate as to meet with two more instances of the probable 

 capture of T. occidenialis in the records of British natiu-al history. The well-known 

 naturalist, Colonel Montagu, who died iu 1815, relates that a torpedo weighing 

 about a hundred pounds, twice as heavy as Hunter's hsh, was found dead on 

 a turbot-hook off "Tenby. Even the oldest fishermen did not know the creature 

 which proves the case to be a very rare one. In the year 1840, William Thompson' 

 Vice-President of the Natural History Society of Belfast, saw in the Museum of 

 the Dublin College of Surgeons the cast of a torpedo thirty-eight inches lono- and 

 twent3--eight inches broad, which had been caught oft' Dublin in 1830. I know of 

 no instance of a European torpedo approaching this size. The coincidence with 

 Hunter's observation was not perceived in either case, and I need hardly add that 

 the columns were not numbered. 



However rare the event may be, it is exceedingly improbable that these three 

 cases— Hunter's, Montagu's, and AVilliam Thompson's, separated from one another 

 by an interval of about thirty years — sliould have been, and remain, the only ones 

 of their kind. And now my aim, in bringing these facts before the Section will, I 

 trust, be apparent. I venture to express a wish that those British zoologists 'in 

 whose power it may be may issue instructions to the fishermen, more part?cularly 

 on the south-western coast of iMigland, to the eflfect that if, in one of their expedi- 

 tions, they should meet with a huge flat fish, similar to a ray, but of circular 

 instead of rhombic shape, and endo^^-ed during life with a power of benumbino- the 

 hand that grasps it, they are requested to preserve such fish with the utmost care 

 and to forward it as speedily as possible to the nearest scientific station. It is 

 needless to indicate the further course to be held. The specimen should be com- 

 pared with Storer's description of his T. occidentalis, and above all, the columns 

 in its electric organs numbered according to the rules laid down bv Professor 

 Fritsch. 



Since Henle's paper on X. dipterygia, this species has been detached from 

 X. hrasiliensis, and annexed to the genus Asfrape as A. capeims. In mv Preliminarv 

 Pieport on Professor Fritsch's Results, read before the Berlin Academy,' I expressed 

 an opinion that A. capensis would present a number of columns about as small 

 as A. dipterygia, and so it proved, a specimen which Professor Peters readily 

 placed at Professor Fritsch's disposal, showing only 14G columns. On the other 

 hand, T. californica, which bears a great resemblance to T. occidentalis has like 

 this species, nearly 1,000 columns. 



The value of the new character of Torpedinidas being thus fullv established 

 Professor Fritsch proceeded to test by it every species he could lay his hands upon' 

 by taking the census of its columns. After having gone over the' specimens of the 

 Berlin Museum, he came to London a few weeks ago, and owin" to the extreme 

 kindness of Professor Owen and Dr. Giinther, he was allowed to continue his work 

 in the splendid collection of the British Museum. Of the results at which he 

 arrived, I shall only mention one here, leaving the other for his own publication. 

 A single glance at the unique and typical .specimen of the T. hebetans, Lowe, froni 

 Madeira, enabled him to predict, from a certain conformity of habitus with T. 

 occidentalis and califor?iica, that this species, although not quite ten inches Ion? 

 would present an equally large number of columns, and he eventually counted' 

 1,025 of them in one of the organs. 



He also saw in the Museum of the College of Surgeons a relic of one of 

 Hunter's specimens, exhibiting the brain and the electrical nerves ; but although in 

 a wonderful state of preservation after so many years, this interesting preparation 

 was of no use to him for his present purpose,' as one of the organs had been 

 entirely, and the other partially removed. 



' Vorldufijcr Bericht uht-r die ron Professor Gustav Fi-itsch in JEgyjiten vnd am 

 Mittclmcer anyestclUvn, newn Untersuchungen an eleMrischeii Fi'sc/ien Zweite 

 Hiilfte. Sitzungsberichte der Kgl. Preuss. Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Berlin 

 4. Mai 1882; St. xxiii. p. 489. j^enm, 



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