320 INDIAN CYPRINID^. Pceonomince. 



Gour, on the northern side of Bengal, where it usually attains two or three feet 

 in length, and is a well flavoured and wholesome food. Its form, he says, is 

 thick, but still slightly compressed, and the colour of the upper part of the 

 body is dark green, with a coppery gloss ; below it is white ; the fins are dark, 

 and the eyes red. Buchanan supposed that of all fishes he had met with in 

 India, the Nand'm has the greatest resemblance to the European Carp, but that 

 many of its qualities are different ; to this I may add, that it wants the dorsal 

 and anal spines of Cyprintis carpio, while it differs from Cyp.Jimhriattis, Bl. in 

 having cirri, as well as a much longer dorsal. 



III. — Cyprinus calbasu, Buch. 

 Op. Cit. PI. 11. f. 83. Kalbasu, and Kundna of the fishermen. 



It is stated by Buchanan that this species is closely allied to the Barbel of 

 Europe; and Cuvier on his authority referred it to that genus, although 

 it has neither the short dorsal, nor the spines of the Barbels. Buchanan's 

 figure though tolerably characteristic, presents the operculum too much 

 rounded, and in his description the dorsal is said to be straight above, although 

 it is falciform, and the nostrils to have but one aperture on either side. 

 Buchanan was aware of the existence of two varieties of this species, and 

 it strikes me he has applied the description of one, to the figure of the 

 other. The following seems to me to be the variety he has figured. 

 General colour deep leaden blue, scales dotted, fins dark, lips pendulous 

 and fimbriated, forty -two scales on the lateral line, fourteen in an oblique row 

 from the base of the ventrals to the dorsum. Fin rays, D.15 : P.17: V.9 or 

 10 : A. 8 : C.g^- There is yet a third kind, probably a distinct species, with 

 red ventrals and forty scales along the lateral line, and twelve in an oblique 

 row from the base of the ventrals to the dorsum. 



The following is a description of the other, or ferruginous variety, 

 Kundhna of the natives :— 



