740 FISHES — INTRODUCTION. 



Ichthyologia Ohiensis | or | Natural History | of | the Fishes Inhabiting the | River 

 Ohio I and its Tributary Streams [ Preceded by a physical description of the Ohio and 

 its branches | by C. S. Rafiaesque, | — | Professor of Botany and Natural History in 

 Transylvania University, Author of the Analysis of Nature, &c., &o., member of the 

 Literary and Philosophical Society of New York, the Historical Society of New York, 

 tbe Lyceum of Natural History of New York, the Academy of Sciences of Philadelphia, 

 the Araeiican Antiquarian Society, the Royal Institute of Natural Sciences of Naples, 

 the Italian Society of Arts and Sciences, the Medical Societies of Lexington and Cinoin- 

 n3(i, &c., &c,, I — I The art of seeing well, or of noticing and distinguishing with 

 accniaoy the objects which we perceive is a high faculty of the mind, unfolded in few 

 indiviriDals, and despised by those who can neither acquire it, nor appreciate its re^ 

 suits I — I Lexington, Kentucky | printed for the Author by W. G. Hunt (price one 

 dollar). I — I 1820 | (1 vol,, 8vo, 90 pp.). 



On the reverse of the title page ; 



Thfse Pages | and the Discoveries which they contain | in one of the principal 

 Branches | of Natural History, | are respectfully Insribed | by the Author | To his fel- 

 low-labcnrere in the same field of Science | Prof. Samuel L. Mitchill, M. D | who has de- 

 scribed the Atlantic Fiehes ot New York, | and to | C. A. LeSueur, | who was the first 

 to explore the Ichthyology of the Great American Lakes, &c. | In token | of Friend- 

 ship, Respect, and Congratulation. 



This singular work has been for several reasons a stumbling block in 

 the progrefs of the study of American Ichthyology. This has been 

 partly owing to errors of observation on the part of the author, partly to 

 the admixture of statements derived from' memory, imagination, or hear- 

 say with statements of fact, and, finally, in no slight degree to the fact 

 that Rafinefque's Recounts were taken from the living fishes, and hence 

 were not to be readily interpreted by workers in the closet with preserved 

 specimens. 



The difiiculty of obtaining the volume, and the fact that several writers 

 of authority, especially French and English, have set the bad example 

 of ignoring Rafinesque's works altogether, because in their limited 

 knowledge of the local fauna, they have be unable readily to determine 

 his species, have also helped to cause confusion. 



Rafinesque's work has been well summed up by Professor Agassiz : 



" Nothing is more to be regretted for the progress of natural history in this country 

 than (bat Kaflneeque did not put up somewhere a collection of all the genera and 

 species he had established, with well-authenticated labels, or that his contemporaries 

 did not follow in his steps, or at least preserve the tradition of his doings, instead of 

 -decr.\i!'g him and appealing to foreign authority against him. Tracing his course as a 

 aatnralisli diiring his residence in this country, it is plain that he alarmed those with 

 whom he had interconrse, by his innovations, and that they preferred to lean upon the 

 :iuthoritj of the great naturalist of the age, then residing in Europe, who, however, 

 knbw Utile of the special history of this country, than to trust a somewhat hasty man 

 who was Hying among them, and who had collected a vast aincuntof information from 

 3ll parts of the States, upon a variety of objects then entirely new to science. From 



