THE SKELETON OF THE BLACK BASS. 



313 



paper as a whole was devoted to the osteology of Amia, aud what I had to say there 

 about that of the black bass was only by way of comparison. While I shall take 

 advantage of those previous researches, the present memoir is piimarily intended to 

 give an account of the skeleton of this well-known bass in its entirety, and, as will be 

 observed, a full-page plate is likewise here given which presents a side view of the 

 entire skeleton of the small-mouthed black bass {j\Iicropterus dolomieu). This is from 

 a photograph made from a specimen prepared by Dr. Jacob L. Wortmau. Fig. 

 27 of my Amia paper gives a left lateral view of the skull of Micropterus salmoides, 

 natural size, being reproduced from a drawing made by me from my own dissections. 

 This ligui-e is here reproduced as lig. 2 of the present memoir There is also given in 





^FH.T. 



.- r^,/<,.r. 



'Fia. 2.— Left lateral view of stnll of 21. salmoides, with the skeleton of other parts connocted with it posteriorly. 

 Natural size and drawn from the actual specimen hy the author from liia own dissections, lettering the 

 same a.s in fig. 3 and other figuics of Ihc memoir. 



fig. 3 of the text the right lateral view of the skull of the small-mouthed black bass, a 

 drawing made from my own dissecti(ms and not before used in any ichthyological paper. 

 This cut will prove especially useful, inasmuch as the skull from which it was drawn is 

 the same as that in the complete skeleton of the sinall-mouthed black bass in plate 44. 

 In no other class of backboned animals is the slcnll so large in proportion to the skel- 

 eton of the trunk or body as it is in fishes, and to this statement the black bass offers 

 no exception. The study of the skull in osseous fishes generally was for a long time 

 considered, even by anatomists, one of themostdifQcultof nil problems in biology, and 

 even at the present time it is by no means an easy task. During the last ten or fifteen 

 years, however, owing to the numerous text-books and various irianunls devoted to the 

 elements of anatomical science, this subject has been very much simplified. 



