566 SUBGEOK-MAJOB DAY OK SOME Or 



were published, is probably due to the Cyprinus nuhta having been 

 omitted. No notice of the gift of skins of fish can be discovered 

 That they may have existed appears probable from the following 

 passage in his paper under the head of Gijprinus nuhta : — " Both 

 Mr. Eiippell and Mr. Tarrell, who have done me the favour to 

 look over my fishes, express their belief that the present fish is 

 only a monstrosity of C. auratus" (p. 355). 



Tlie next officer who examined some of the fishes of these parts 

 was Dr. Wyllie (see Proc. Zool. Soc. 1840, p. 34), who was struck 

 with the accessory branchial sacs of the Saccobranchus singio, 

 which he considered were " perhaps intended for reservoirs of 

 water to enable the animal during its migrations from tank to 

 tank to maintain the gills in a constantly moist condition. They 

 may also perhaps serve, in ordinary circumstances, as an extension 

 of the respiratory surface ; and the numerous blood-vessels that 

 are seen in their coats would tend to give a probability to such a 



conjecture They are of loose cellular texture, of a whitish 



grey colour, speckled with numerous minute black points ; they 

 are traversed from one extremity to the other by a blood-vessel 

 of considerable size, into which numerous small branches open at 

 right angles." 



I believe Dr. "Wyllie to have been correct in the last part of his 

 observation, that this sac or sacs (which extend backwards from 

 the gill-cavity, amongst the muscles on either side of the neural 

 spines) are receptacles for air, that air is taken in by a con- 

 stricted orifice existing between the superior and the next 

 branchia, and that the single blood-vessel is employed in return- 

 ing arterial blood to the general circulation, it having been oxyge- 

 nated in the air-sac*. It appears to pass to the lowest branchial 

 arch ; but I must leave this subject for a future paper. Irrespective 

 of this air-sac, an air-vessel or air-bladder enclosed in bone exists, 

 and is connected by a tube with the pharynx, as is usual in the 

 Physostomi. 



Since then Col. Play fair has received some specimens from 

 Poena, which have been deposited in the British Museum. 

 Personally I have collected in the Kistna and its afiluents at 

 Kurnool, Bezwada, and Masulipatam, also in the Godavery from 

 Eajahmundy to its mouth. I have also obtained a few species 

 from the Nerbudda at Jubbulpore, from the tanks at Hurdah, and 

 had a collection made for me at Poonah and in its vicinity. 



* These fishes take in and blow out globules of air. 



