333 
FIERASFER. 
This genus is separated by Cuvier from that of Ophidium, with 
which it had been mingled with the character of having the dorsal 
and anal fins united to form the tail, as in the Eels; the body 
lengthened and the vent far behind, as in these fish, but with the 
distinction from the genera Anguilla and Mm-mna, in having the openings 
of the gills widely cleft. It is also without barbs above or below the 
jaws. Apodal fishes. 
OPHIDIUM EEL. 
BEARDLESS OPHIDIUM. 
Beardless Ophidium, 
Ophidian imherhe, 
Ophidium imherhe, 
Ophidie imherhe, 
Ophidium imherhe, 
(t (( 
Willoughby; p. 113, Table G. 7, f. 1. 
LiKNiEUS; but he classes it with 
Jugular fishes. 
Bloch, Schneider, PI. 90, but at page 
486 he terms it 0. Chinense. 
Lacepedb. Pennant; vol. iv, pi. 93. 
Fleming; Br. Animals, p. 201. 
Jenyns; Manual, p. 481. 
Rondeletids, who appears to have been the first who has 
noticed this fish, remarks that it is as much like a Conger as 
one egg is to another. 
Ihis little fish is so far one of the rarest in Britain, that it 
is only mentioned as having been found twice on our shores; 
the earliest of w'hich was near Weymouth, and of which 
Pennant has given a characteristic likeness. Xhe other was 
found by Montagu on the south coast of Devonshire; but some 
degree of doubt falls on it, since, when it died, w'hich it did 
presently after being taken, it assumed a spasmodically distorted 
shape, very different from what is represented in Pennant’s 
figure and that by Bloch as published by Schneider; the latter 
