+ 
290 Storer on the 2 
all in my power towards the accomplishment of so desirable 
an object. I at once commenced my labors, by writing to 
all parts of the State from whence I could hope for the 
slightest aid, and by engaging upon the spot the services 
of intelligent fishermen. I had thus labored for months, 
almost despairing of accomplishing any thing satisfactorily, 
when, in the latter part of that year, it was intimated that 
another season would probably be allowed the Commis- 
sioners for a continuance of their investigations. Having 
found the previous catalogue, upon examination, so ex- 
ceedingly erroneous and defective that no reliance could 
be placed on it, and consequently that no reference could 
be made to the fishes therein contained, I at once deter- 
mined to attempt the formation of another, entirely inde- 
pendent of it. To make a catalogue, however, without at 
the same time furnishing some characters by which species - 
could be recognised, would be presenting a mere list of 
names, perfectly useless. I had then no alternative left - 
me but to collect and minutely describe every individual - 
species. Many of the species described by Mitchell, 5 
“ Fishes of New York," and by Le Sueur, in his various - 
papers, inhabit our waters; but asthe Aistory of the former - 
is contained in the volume of a Society’s Transactions, 
which is very difficult to-obtain,—and the contributions of 
the latter are distributed through the pages of scientific 
journals equally inaccessible to the general reader, I have 
described anew, without regarding the previous aces unts, 
every species which has fallen under my observatio 
Since December, 1837, but a little more than a year, a all the 
descriptions have been written. Could I have known, at 
first, that two seasons would have been allowed me for the 
prosecution of my labor, better specimens might, in many | 
instances, have been procured for description, and the hur- 
ried manner, in which several of the descriptions have 
been necessarily written, would have been avoided. | 
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