250 



INDIAN CYPRINID^. 



How nicely does all this correspond with the character of rasorial 

 birds and quadrupeds given by Swainson ! " Their toes are never united 

 so as to be used for swimming, a peculiarity which confines them to dry 

 land or to climbing among trees." " This is the type," says the philosophical 

 observer just alluded to, " so remarkable for the greatest development of 

 tail, and for those appendages for ornament or defence which decorate the 

 head. If we went through the whole class of birds, and selected those 

 beginning with the Peacock, wherein the tail was most conspicuous either 

 for its size or for the beauty of its colours, we should unknowingly fix upon 

 those birds which analysis has already demonstrated to be rasorial types. 

 The same results would attend a similar selection of quadrupeds and of 

 winged insects ; all these collectively would furnish many hundred proofs 

 by which the uniformity of this type is preserved ; appendages to the head, 

 whether in the shape of horns, crests, or fleshy protuberances are no less a 

 prevalent character of the group now before us."* 



48. These peculiarities will be found exactly to apply to Cobitis prop., 

 which I shall now prove. 



First with regard to tail, the Loaches are the only group of CyprinideB 

 in which the caudal is not bifid or divided by a fissure into two lobes, 

 reducing its size and power as an organ for propelling the body forward ; and 

 on the tails of several, especially Cobitis pavonacea, J. M.f we have even the 

 zoned or eye-like spots exactly resembling those of the Peacock, although no 

 instance of the kind is to be found in any other group of Cyprinid(s ; and in all 



* Geog. Dist. and Class. Quad. 258. 



t PI. 52. f. 1. 



