12 
INDIAN FRESH* WATER FISHES. 
name of a plant or animal is the name of the genus. 
The second, distinctive, or specific name is frequently 
nothing but an adjective . Thus, for instance, “ Bar- 
bus immaculatus,” the u unspotted barbel,” denotes 
a fish of the genus Barbus. The name of the genus 
is thus a kind of surname. Thus it happens that 
when an author sees fit to alter the classification 
adopted by previous writers, and to place a fish 
in a different genus, he at the same time alters the 
name of the fish itself. The consequence is, that 
the same fish may be described in four or five books 
by as many different names. 
A most valuable aid to the study of Ichthyology 
is the British Museum descriptive Catalogue of Fishes, 
by Dr. Albert Gunther, in 8 vols., in which the whole 
subject is treated in a comprehensive and masterly 
manner, and where all the names by which every 
known fish has been described by different authors is 
given, that specific name under which it was first 
described being accepted as the name of the fish, 
according to the recognised rule. 
It is most devoutly to be hoped that future writers 
will endeavour, so far as possible, to follow the classi- 
fication therein given, every deviation from which 
only tends to land us in a state of prgegimtherite con- 
fusion. 
(N.B. Yols. Y. and YII. of Gunther’s work, contain- 
ing the Families Siluridoe and Cyprinidse, are those 
most particularly interesting to the Indian student.) 
