290 CLASSIFICATION OF FISHES. 



ordinary herrings; and Cuvier. while he places it next to 

 Chirocentrus, assimilates it to the salraon-trout, hy the 

 '' hooked teeth on the jaws, the vomer, the palatines, 

 and the tongue." The best account of these curious 

 fishes, however, will he found in Le Sueur's own words^ 

 The hyodons, as he observes, " inhabit the river Ohio 

 and the lake Erie, where they go under the popular 

 name of herrings. They have, in eflPect,"' continues our 

 author, "^ much resemblance to ClupecB in their co- 

 lour, their large eyes and scales, and the compressed 

 form of their body, — and with which genus they may be 

 confounded on a superficial view: but it is easy to distin- 

 guish them by the absence of the carinated abdomen; by 

 their extremely short intermaxiilaries • and maxillaries, 

 which are articulated together; and by every part of the 

 mouth being strongly toothed, as in the salmon family of 

 Cuvier. They have in a great measure -the habits of 

 these last; as, hke them, they appear to prey upon hving 

 animals, paVticularly insects, which they take on the 

 surface of the water. The stomachs of several of these 

 fishes, which were examined, were filled in the spring 

 with ScarahcFi and the larva oi Ephemera; the perfect 

 insects of the latter, at that period, being observed, in 

 immense multitudes, swarming over the surface of the 

 Ohio* The want of an adipose fm in our fishes," con- 

 cludes this excellent zoologist, " excludes them from the 

 genus Salmo: by their teeth they seem to approximate 

 to the genera Chirocentrus and Erythrinus of Cuvier 

 and Gronovius, and the Amia of Lacepede : but they 

 differ from the first by the vomer being furnished with 

 teeth ; from the second, also, by the teeth ; and from 

 the third by the pectorals, the dorsal, the teeth, the gill- 

 covers, &c." He then describes two species with great 

 accuracy, H. tergisus, and chdalis (^fig. 6l.). For 

 the present we follow Le Sueur and Cuvier in associ- 

 ating this genus with Cliirocentrus, not from any convic- 

 tion that their resemblance is one of affinity, but, until 

 the Salmones are better understood, and the sub-genera 

 naturally arranged, we think it preferable not to make any 



