1916.] Fauna of the Chilka Lake : Fish. 437 



two black spots, "one at the end of the tail (caudal peduncle) and another at the root 

 of the dorsal fin" — a few lines below in the second para, he says " besides the five 

 spots mentioned in the specific character " (p. 310). This five is obviously a misprint 

 for two. In the third para, he makes another obvious mistake by stating " there are 

 four tendrils, so very minute, as often to be scarcely perceptible " (p. 311). The figure 

 in the illustration which he specially refers to in the text does not show any trace of 

 barbels whatever, nor in his Index Methodicus (synoptical table, 42) which follows the 

 introductory remarks in English, and which contains brief scientific descriptions in 

 Latin of all the species, — do the barbels find any place (p. 389). Therefore the state- 

 ment as to four minute barbels must also be regarded as a mistake or oversight. 

 McClelland, Cuvier, Valenciennes, and Günther all took up this position and decided 

 that the species C. sophore described by Hamilton Buchanan was the little Barbus 

 without barbels so common in the ponds of Bengal. Day, however, disputed this 

 point, and he thought that by the name C. sophore Hamilton Buchanan described a 

 Barbus with four barbels and the name should be restricted to some fish which must 

 have four barbels even if it had no resemblance to the figure nor any reference to 

 other portions of his description. In going over the collection of fish in the Museum 

 of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, Day came across one "bleached" specimen of a 

 small Barbus with four barbels, but without any name or label for locality or donor. 

 This Day at once concluded to be a typical specimen of C. sophore in spite of its long 

 barbels and colourless condition, 1 and when twelve other small Barbus (some of which 

 were undoubtedly young — their lengths without the caudal fin varying from 24 mm. to 

 58 mm.) similar to the bleached specimen came to the Museum from the Khasia Hills, 

 forwarded by Mr. R. Bevan/ Day at once concluded that the bleached fish without 

 a label must have come from the Khasia Hills ! He also concluded that this was the 

 Cyprinus sophore of Hamilton Buchanan. In arriving at this conclusion Day 

 entirely disregarded the fact that Hamilton Buchanan's C. sophore was ''very com- 

 mon in ponds" in Bengal. The Khasia species has rather long barbels and the 

 colouration and proportions are different ; it is a comparatively rare species and even 

 according to Day is to be found only in " Assam and Khasia Hills" {Faun. Brit. Ind., 

 Fish., I, p. 309). Thus disregarding the conclusions of Cuvier, McClelland, Günther 

 and others, Day wanted to apply the name sophore to a very rare species of Barbus 

 from Assam, a species with four long barbels and of a very different colouration from 

 that given by Hamilton Buchanan for his sophore. 



There is another specimen in the collection of the Indian Museum 3 purchased 

 from Day on the 8th September, 1879, which is labelled " Barbus sophore (H.B.) " 

 in Day's own handwriting. The locality of this specimen is given by Day as 

 Basein, Burma. It has only two maxillary barbels and is without any dark 



1 This specimen is in the collection of the Indian Museum numbered No. F — ^ in the register of 

 the Museum. Its total length without the caudal fin is 86 mm. 



1 These specimens are numbered F **£■* to F ^ in the register of the Indian Museum. 

 3 This specimen is numbered 2734 in the register of the Indian Museum. 



