40 Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. {February, 1912. 
self, Buchanan) studied those of the Ganges ' in a manner that 
was unusually comprehensive at that date. The beautiful 
drawings that were prepared under his supervision are still in 
the possession of the Asiatic Society of Bengal. He was fol- 
lowed by a number of other naturalists, among whom Blyth, 
the curator of this Society’ s museum, and Day, the author of 
the volumes on fish in the official “ Fauna of British India’? 
and of several other important ichthyological works, were con- 
shoes figures. 
recent years less attention has perhaps been devoted to 
fish aie: to certain groups of invertebrates. Large collections 
of the freshwater species have, however, been made, especially 
by Mr. M. Mackenzie in Bihar; and Mr. B. L. Chaudhuri’s 
examination of these and other collections in the Indian 
Museum already pg Ae that many new species will have to 
be described. It is well known also that much of the older 
work stands in rast heed of revision. Perhaps the most inter- 
esting result as yet achieved has been the re-discovery of the 
two freshwater sting-rays (Trygon fluviatilis and Hypolophus 
sephen)* briefly noticed by Hamilton at the beginning of last 
century. 
At present it is eget impossible to estimate what has 
been accomplished in the study of freshwater mollusca of the 
dian Empire. In Hanley and Theobald’s ‘‘Conchologia 
Indica ’’ (1876) about 200 species are figured, but their list is now 
far from complete and most of the necessary information is scat- 
tered through papers published in different scientific periodicals 
and often at variance with one another. It is announced that a 
volume on the freshwater mussels (Unionidae) will > be 
Saami in the ‘‘ Fauna of British India ’’ series by . B. 
Preston, who has already ence the Asiatic speciciias of 
this family in the Indian Mus 
It i s nearly forty years ats the late Mr. J. Wood-Mason 
siisahiiced in the Indian seum, of which he was then 
Deputy Superintendent, the study of the freshwater crustacea 
of India and Burma. Although his published work ® in this 
tion with the monograph of the Indian freshwater crabs (Pota- 
monidae) published by Colonel Alcock * in 1910 as part of the 


: as Account of the Fishes found in the Liver Ganges: Edinburgh 
(1822). 
2 Chaudhuri, J.A.S.B. (N.S. ; VII, 
als 
p. 625 (1912). Both of these 
rays are found md: 
: “ in the Bay of Bengal : see Annandale, Mem. 
.B., XL, pt. II, pp. 189, a ee 1871); XLII, pt. I 
p- 258 (1873), and P-A.S.B., 1875, p. 230. i ood : 
+ Catalogu 
of Indian mica Crustacea in the Indian Museum, 
pt. I, Fase. ii, Caléutia (1910). 
