SAND-EELS. 
569 
Genus AMMODYTES. 
Body more or less terete ( only slightly compressed). 
Branchiostegal 
The extremely similar species that form this germs, 
have long been known. At the middle of the fifteenth 
century Salvianus described and figured the ‘ sandilz 
(Sand-Eel) of English waters, and gave an account of 
its habits and the manner in which it was taken. The 
figure and description recur in Gesner", who gave the 
genus its Greek name * 6 * * 9 . Ray 6 and JagcG mention two 
species; but although we can see, from the statement of 
the latter as to the length of the fish described and figured 
by him (1572 Gi.), that he referred to a species regarded 
as .distinct in modern times {Ammodytes lanceolatus), still 
the supposed specific distinction was based merely on 
defects in the figure of Salvianus. Artedi described 6 
the smaller of our forms both fully and accurately, 
but did not distinguish between it and the larger one. 
In his Sy sterna Natures f Linnaeus adopted only one spe- 
cies {Am. Tobianus), the name of the species being 
clearly derived from Artedi’s quotation of Sciione- 
velde ? ; but in his Fauna Suecica h he draws attention 
to the fact that in his travels through Oland' he had 
found more fin-rays in the Sand-Eel than Artedi, to 
which fact he probably refers when he remarks, in the 
A longitudinal dermal ridge on each side of the belly, 
or 8. 
twelfth edition of his Systema (1766): “In Sweden there 
seem to be two distinct species, as Ray once conjec- 
tured was the case in England.” There is no doubt, 
however, that in 1744-' Klein had already distinguished 
between Artedi’s Tobianus and Jago’s “ Ammodytes 
Anglorum verus, The. Bounce, sive True Sand-Eel’ 
though without giving them binomial names. After- 
wards, in 1810*, when Rafinesque described his Ammo- 
dytes cicerelus, the three European species now accepted 
became known; but the largest of them was without 
any binomial specific name, which it first received in 
1824 of Lesauvage'. The natural relations between 
these three species, as they are distinguished at present, 
may be expressed as follows: 
A: Pectoral fins shorter than the lower jaw: 
a: The whole body behind the head 
scaly, with the scales on the sides 
of the body hidden in transverse 
dermal folds even on the forepart Ammodytes lanceolatus. 
b: Forepart of the body naked, with- 
out transverse dermal folds Ammodytes cicerelus. 
B: Pectoral fins longer than the lower 
jaw Ammodytes tobianus. 
rays 7 
a Paralipomena , p. 3. 
6 From ay yog, sand and dvzyg, diver. 
c Syn. Meth. Pise., p. 38. 
d Ibid., p. 165, fig. 12. 
e Spec. Pise., p. 55. 
f Ed. X, tom. I, p. 247 ; ed. XII, tom. I, p. 430. 
9 To which form Schoneveede himself referred, is a question difficult to decide. Ichth. Slesv. Hols., p. 76. 
h Ed. I, p. 114; ed. II, p. 109. 
i It. CEl., p. 87. 
j Hist. Pise. Nat. Prom. Miss. IV, pp. 55 and 56, tab. XII, figs. 8 — 10. 
k Caratteri d. ale. n. gen., p. 21, Tab. IX, fig. 4. 
^ Bull. Sc., Soc. Philom. 1824, p. 140. 
