Perilampus. 



INDIAN CYPRINIDiE. 



391 



Perilampus, J. M. 



Characters. — Head small and raised, suborbitar plates broad below, and 

 narrow behind the eyes : mouth small, and directed upward, so that the apices 

 of the jaws are raised to the altitude of the crown, the lower jaw is armed 

 at the point with a blunt knob or equivalent organ to teeth. The tongue is 

 thick and wrinkled. The body is much compressed ; the back straight or only 

 very slightly raised under the dorsal ; the belly or lower margin is very pro- 

 minent, and the sides are marked with bright colours, mostly blue. The caudal 

 is large, a small dorsal is placed opposite to a large anal, the ventrals and 

 pectorals are small, but in some the ventrals are composed of elongated rays, 

 apparently to facilitate the effort to rise into the air. 



They are without spines, and often with long setaceous cirri. 



I. — Cyprinus devario, Buch. 



t. 45. f. 2.— P. G. t. 61. f. 94. 



This species has been referred by Cuvier to his sub-genus Cyprinus pro- 

 prius. To me that group does not seem to be either natural or well defined, 

 in as much as the dorsal spine is by no means commonly associated with a 

 lengthy dorsal fin ; indeed both the characters alluded to are so artificial that 

 they cannot be had recourse to in forming any group of Cyprinidce. Authors 

 from a diffidence to reject altogether a group that has received the sanction of 

 so high an authority as Cuvier, are continually in the habit of modifying the 

 characters of the group in question, to suit the particular species they meet 

 with, as I have done to bring Cyprinus semiplotus into it ; but were I acquainted 

 sufficiently with European species, I might have had no hesitation in making 

 Cyprinus semiplotus the type of a new group. Cyprinus carpio, on which the 

 group is founded, seems to me to be strictly a Barbel, uniting that genus with 



