S92 Description of a collection of Fishes from China. 



by a membrane so as to form a kind of wing, not large 

 enough, however, to enable it to fly. Cuvier with prophetic 

 caution rejected this species, because he could not compre- 

 hend clearly the text of the author, published in the Me- 

 moirs of the Society of Harlem, t. xx, part 2, p. 336, quoted 

 dans r Histoire Nat. des Poissons, vol. 4, p. 15, in order 

 to shew with what facility an error is propagated when once 

 admitted into works of authority.* 



The way in which all this confusion arose in the first 

 instance may, perhaps, be explained by supposing the origi- 

 nal describer to have confounded the ventral, with the pec- 

 toral fins of Trigla spinosa, which together with the three 

 intermediate rays, would exactly make up the number 

 (twenty) of the rays ascribed to the supposed wings. 



I have noticed under the proper head, the probability 

 of the species of Sebastes here described being the Sebastes 

 albofasciatus^ Cuv. the history of which is so singular, 

 as partly derived from a Japanese work, that I may be 

 excused for adverting to it in this place. Cuvier having first 

 identified a species of his genus Sebastes in certain Japanese 

 drawings, with the aid of M. Abel Remuset, found the accom- 

 panying Japanese description to correspond with that of the 

 Sebastes of the North sea. The fish is described by the 

 Japanese as common on their coasts, where it attains three 

 feet in length ; they inform us that its flesh is white and rich, 

 and that it is much sought after by their fishermen in the 

 winter season, &c.. Subsequently, the actual fish itself, as des- 

 cribed in the Japanese writings, having been forwarded from 



* Here are a few of the names bestowed on this supposed species, 

 which, from the facts now brought forward in regard to Trigla spinosa^ 

 we have additional reason to believe does not exist. The Red wing 

 (rouget aile) of Houttuyn. Trigla rubicunda, Hornsdetedt in his Dutch 

 translation of Syst. Naturse, Trigla Japonica, Shaw Gen. Zool. Dactylop- 

 terus, Lacep. 111. p. 335, Trigla alata, Gm. Syst. Linn, and subse- 

 quently repeated in the different Dictionaries of Natural History. 



