282 CLASSIFICATION OF FISHES. 



is the type, and thus confine it to such as have the helly 

 not serrated : possessing much of the general form of 

 Thryssa, these small fishes are nevertheless much more 

 slender ; the cleft or commissure of the mouth is more 

 horizontal ; the top of the muzzle more projecting over 

 the mouth ; and the jaws or maxillaries, as Cuvier well 

 remarks, less prolonged : the anal fin, which is long in 

 Thryssa, is shorter in Engraulis. M. Cuvier alludes to 

 an anchovy found in America, his E. edentatus, which 

 is without any teeth : we have not seen this ; but as it 

 would appear to have a serrated belly, we should place 

 it as an aberrant Thryssa, forming another link in the 

 chain of those species which unite the toothed Thryssa 

 with the toothless Chatoessi. Leaving this sub-genus, 

 we pass on to Elops and Butirinus, because M. Cuvier 

 observes of the latter, that " the muzzle is prominent 

 like the anchovies:" both, however, differ from those 

 fish, in the mouth being smaller. On looking to the 

 figure of Elops saurus (Bloch, 393. f. 1.), the ichthy- 

 ologist will be fully persuaded that its affinity is with 

 Engraulis, and that its analogy is with Clupea : its 

 rather wide mouth, opening horizontally ; the great pro- 

 longation of the maxillaries, which reach far beyond the 

 eye ; and the distinct teeth, establish the first of these 

 relations : while the size and position of the ventral fin, 

 as well as the shortness of the anal, render this fish so like 

 a true herring, that if the snout was concealed, and the 

 belly serrated, it would pass for such. Of Commerson's 

 genus Butirinus, which we have not seen, Cuvier inti- 

 mates that it has all the characters of Elops, except in 

 having " the muzzle prominent, the mouth but slightly 

 cleft, and the tongue, vomer, and palatines paved with 

 rounded teeth set close together." Now, as there must 

 be aberrant species between the types of Engraulis and 

 Elops, we look upon these fishes, at present, as being 

 such; but it will still remain a question which of these 

 is the true type, or, rather, w T hich is subordinate to the 

 other: the form of the jaws in Butirinus would cer- 

 tainly lead us to place it next to the anchovies, while 



