HASEMAN, GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIB UTION IN 80 VTH AMERICA 55 



These, then, were actually some of the characters of the primitive 

 Cichlidse of the eastern and western hemispheres. . 



These ancestral, primitive or phylogenetic characters may be desig- 

 nated paleotelic, a term which has already been used in a similar sense 

 by Gregory in his book on the orders of mammals. 



In contrast to these paleotelic cichlid characters are the four to thir- 

 teen anal spines of Cichlasoma and other genera, the long gill rakers of 

 Chcetobranchus and Chcetobranchopsis, the lobe on the upper branch of 

 the first gill arch of Geophagus and Hetero gramma, the long teeth of 

 Ptenia, the chisel or incisor teeth of Uraru, the long and more slender 

 body of Crenicichla, etc. These recent, adaptive or physiological char- 

 acters may be designated cenotelic. There is no evidence that any of 

 these cenotelic characters have been distributed anywhere excepting in 

 South and Central America, because it is these and other characters 

 which distinguish the Cichlidse of the western hemisphere from those of 

 the eastern. 



I cannot overemphasize the importance of paleotelic and cenotelic 

 characters, because many zoologists and paleontologists have not made 

 any distinction between these two types of characters in their tabulated 

 comparisons of various faunal regions. In the case of cichlid fishes, 

 cenotelic characters have evidently to do with the origin and dispersal of 

 variation, species, etc., while paleotelic characters deal with the ancestral 

 fauna which gave rise to these genera. The paleotelic characters have 

 to do with the ancient distribution, hence theories like Archhelenis; 

 while the cenotelic have to do with the present distribution of a given 

 genus. The cenotelic characters are usually modified by the action of 

 the environment on the ancestral forms of a given genus, while the paleo- 

 telic characters in part have extended down through all of the genera of 

 the cichlid family. Therefore, from the standpoint of the origin and 

 lines of dispersal of the Cichlidse, a few paleotelic characters will out- 

 weigh a bookful of cenotelic ones. 



What shall we learn, then, by a careful compilation of all of the Cich- 

 lidse of South America and Africa and by comparing all of those found 

 in one river basin with those found in another ? Would this show that 

 a connection had existed between certain points of Africa and South 

 America? Or would it merely be a compilation of cenotelic characters 

 formed by the action of the environments of the different localities on 

 the ancestral Cichlidse which possessed paleotelic and not the recent 

 cenotelic or secondary characters? 



Prom the standpoint of the origin of the ancestral Cichlidse, then, the 

 living species or the specific characters alone give us no clue, because 



