NATURAL SCIENCES OP PHILADELPHIA. 



175 



and who probably was not acquainted with the works of Artedi, Linnaeus or 

 Gronovius. 



He often gives the size of the fish, but he maybe found fault with for having 

 sometimes given measurements of parts without that of the whole. 



Whatever may be the merits and defects of Parra, it is not the less true that 

 his work has become indispensable, for Bloch has established several species 

 on the sole authority of his figures, and because Cuvier and Valenciennes have 

 often quoted him, as well as M. Hollard. 



I propose to put scientific names to Parra's figures, with some necessary re- 

 marks, and shall use the labors of my predecessors while often correcting them. 

 The chief writers who have cited Parra, are Bloch, Cornide, Cuvier, Valen- 

 ciennes, Guichenot, Müller and Henle, and Hollard. 



Bloch has named almost all the figures of Parra in his posthumous work en- 

 titled Systema Ichthyologise iconibus CX.. illustratum, published by Schneider in 

 1801. When the species appeared to be a new one he kept the vulgar name of the 

 author, even in doubtful cases. He was often mistaken, and was corrected by 

 Cuvier and Valenciennes, to whom he repeatedly serves as a guide. 



Cornide, author of an Ensayo de una historia de loa Peces y otras producciones 

 marinas de la costa de Galicia, 1788, names Parra's fi9h in a confidential letter 

 addressed to M. Casimiro Gomez Ortega, Director of the Botanical Garden in 

 Madrid ; which letter is published in the first volume of his work, printed at 

 Paris in 1818, under the title of Colección de Papeles científicos, históricos y políti- 

 cos sobre la isla de Cuba. Cornide was not very successful in his determina- 

 tions ; he constantly refers the American species to others he had observed in 

 Europe. He recognized but four Linnaean species, and these the most striking 

 ones, namely, a Fistularia, a Diodon, and two Squali. He did not even notice 

 the Balistes vetula, nor the Lophius vespertilio. He often gives only the genus, 

 and not always correctly, so far as to confound a Chaetodon with a Sparus 

 and a Serranus with a Labrus. 



Cuvier, in his notes to the Régne Animal, second edition, torn. 2, 1 81 7, has named 

 several of Parra's figures, and also in his Histoire générale et particular e des Pois- 

 $0ws,which began to appear in 1828, with the assistance of Valenciennes, and stop- 

 ped in 1849 with the 22d volume, at the end of the Abdominal Malacopterygians. 

 The opinion of these celebrated ichthyolgists is of the greatest weight, from 

 their known scientific attainments, and because they had at their disposal al- 

 most all the fish described in the work of Parra; some having been given by 

 myself, together with my own drawings ; the others by M. Desmarest, who re- 

 ceived them from M. Fournier. 



M. Guichenot undertook the part relating to Fish in the Histoire politique, 

 physique et naturelle of M. Ramon de la Sagra. He has not omitted to quote 

 Parra's work, but he seems to have taken small pains while doing so, and to 

 have relied on Cuvier and Valenciennes, whose correct determinations and 

 whose errors he reproduces. In the families not treated of by these naturalists 

 he generally determines his species from Hollard. 



M. Saco has corrected the nomenclature of Cornide, with the assistance of 

 M. Guichenot's work, and without studying Parra's work. This distinguished 

 author, having no knowledge of Ichthyology, and not being familiar with what 

 is known as Synonymy, has not made the best use of his model. 



Parra is quoted in Müller and Henle's work on Plagiostomes, in the Mono- 

 graph of the Gymnodonts of Hollard, in the Fishes of New York, by Dr. DeKay, 

 and by Dr. Bleeker in several of his articles. 



As for myself, it will be seen on examination how much I have added to and 

 corrected all that has hitherto been done. The opinion of authors has not 

 been given without care. I have compared their descriptions with those of 

 Parra, and with actual specimens, having the advantage of working in Havana, 

 and of knowing the fish by their popular names. My authority is therefore of 

 some weight, even where my names are the same as those given by others ; in 

 1863.] 



