14 BULLETIN : MUSEUM OF COMPARATIVE ZOOLOGY. 



Volta narrates in considerable detail the history of the principal col- 

 lections which furnislied him with material. Of these there were ten 

 belonging to Veronese gentlemen, the most notable one being the prop- 

 erty of Count Gazola, with which the Bozza and Dionisi collections 

 became shortly afterwards united. The circumstances which deprived 

 Count Gazola of most of his specimens in 1797, their removal to Paris 

 by order of First Consul Bonaparte, and their presentation by him to 

 tiie Museum of Natural History in that city are familiar historical facts. 



The second largest suite of fossil fishes was that belonging to the 

 Marchese Ottavio di Canossa, which afterwards became enlarged by the 

 purchase of Julius Caesar Moreni's collection. Agassiz never had access 

 to the Canossa Collection, nor in fact to any in Italy, but portions 

 of it were described by subsequent authors at various times. The collec- 

 tion remained intact at Verona until 1903, when it passed into the 

 possession of natural histor}' dealers and museums of several countries. 

 Heckel's figured specimen of Palapohalistuni orhiculatiun, for instance, 

 was acquired by the British >ruseum, Massalongo's types of Archiophis 

 were divided between the Harvard and Berlin Museums, and the Car- 

 negie Museum at Pittsburg also obtained several of Massalongo's figured 

 specimens. 



Coimt Gaznla's first care on suffering the loss of his splendid collec- 

 tion was to undertake the formation of a new one. Excavations at 

 Bolca were recommenced, and on the death of Count Ronconi a number 

 of fine specimens which he had brought together passed into Gazola's 

 hands ; the result of all this activity being that, phoenix-like, his museum 

 became speedily rehabilitated. This second collection of Count Gazola 

 is preserved in the Museo Civico of Verona, but is not now, and un- 

 fortiniately never has been, fully accessible for study. The scientific 

 value of this collection was fully appreciated by Jacob Meckel, who first 

 visited it in 1850. The condition in which he found the museums of 

 Verona, Padua, Venice, and other cities at that time is set forth by him 

 in a highly entertaining nan*ative which he communicated to the Vienna 

 Academy,^ under whose patronage the journey was undertaken. In 

 referring to the Gazola Collection, he laments particularly the fact that 

 it never came under Agassiz's observation, for this " heerliches Material," 

 as he calls it, would have helped him to a much more complete under- 

 standing of many interesting species, and even genera, and would have 

 enriched our knowledge of the Bolca fauna with valuable details. 



1 Heckel, J., Bericht iiber eine Reise, etc. (Sitzungsber Akad. Wissensch. 

 Wien, VII. p. 318), 1851. 



