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Malacopteeous Abdominals. FISHES. Characinoids. 149 
representatives of the northern Salmon family. Many 
of them are important articles of diet with the natives. 
The Dorado or Pirayu {Salminm orhignyanus), 
which receives its popular name from its bright golden- 
yellow colour, appears at times in such quantities in 
the rivers Uruguay and Parana as to obstruct the navi- 
gation, and the fishermen are said to be able to smell 
the passing sculls from a distance. The fish is much 
esteemed, and is readily caught by a hook baited with 
meat. The Pacd {Prochilodus lincatus), a fish of the 
same rivers and also of the Plata, is reported to be 
delicious. Like the other species which are numerous 
in the Brazils, the lips of the Pacu are remarkably 
thick, and are fringed densely with teeth as slender as 
hairs. The Nefasch {Disticliodus) is a fish of the 
Nile, which lives on water plants, cropping them with 
its teeth, that are well-formed for the purpose. Fishing 
parties are frequently represented on the walls of the 
ancient Egyptian temples, with the dried fish suspended 
in the boats ; and Herodotus informs us that fish was 
an important article of food to the inhabitants of ancient 
Egypt. The rowers are represented as standing to 
their oars in these boats. 
The Caribitos (Serrasalmo) are Characinoids noted 
in all the warm districts of America for their extreme 
blood-thirstiness. They are compressed rhomboidal 
fish, whose jaws are armed with chisel-shaped, very 
sharp teeth, with which they attack bathers, carrying 
otf a morsel of flesh at each bite so quickly and cleanly 
that the sufferer is scarcely aware at the moment of 
the injury he has sustained. If an animal falls into the 
water it is speedily devoured by swarms of these carni- 
vorous fish ; and Humboldt has reported, though with 
some I’eserve, a story which was current when he was 
travelling in Venezuela: — A gentleman and his horse 
in crossing the Orinoco at a ford were half reduced to 
the condition of skeletons before they reached the oppo- 
site bank. Though this cannot be literally true, it 
shows the popular idea of the voracity of these fishes. 
Their haunts are at the bottoms of the rivers, but a 
few drops of blood suffice to bring them by thousands 
to the surface ; and Humboldt himself mentions that in 
some pirts of the Apure, where the water was perfectly 
clear and no fish were visible, he could in a few minutes 
bring together a cloud of Caribitos bj" casting in some 
bits of flesh. The Piranha {Serrasalmo piraya) of 
the Rio San Francisco is thus mentioned by M. Auguste 
St. Hilaire: — “When the country is in flood the horned 
cattle resort to little hills that rise out of the water, and 
as these would in their turn be submerged, the inha- 
bitants go in little boats to make the animals take the 
water and swim to the firm land. In these passages 
the poor beasts are exposed to the cruel attacks of the 
Piranhas, or Devil-fish, which seldom reach two feet 
in length, but which swim in large bands, and have 
triangular trenchant teeth in their jaws. If an animal 
or a man falls into the water, it is instantly attacked 
by these fish, and the bite is as keen as the cut of a 
razor.” He adds that the Piranhas have firm flesh, of 
a very delicate flavour. The Phagrus of the ancient 
Egyptians is supposed by M. Valenciennes to be a 
Characinoid, which bears the poetic name in modern 
Arabic of Gamor el lelleh (Star of the Night), and in 
ichthyology of Citharinus Geoffrcei; and the Kell el 
bahr, or River Dog {Hijdrocyon Forskalii), is another 
of the same family, believed to be the ancient Lepi- 
dotus. These two in conjunction with the Oxyrhyn- 
chus, according to mythological fable related by 
Plutarch, devoured a certain part of Osiris, when his 
body cut up into fourteen pieces had been scattered 
over the waters by Typho. Isis, the wife of Osiris, 
after a painful search recovered thirteen pieces, and to 
supply the absence of the missing one consecrated a 
representative of it ; but the fish that in conformity 
with their carnivorous habits had made the sacrilegious 
abstraction, were ever afterwards held in abhorrence 
by the Egyptians. The negroes of Senegal, however, 
esteem the Kell el bahr to be a very edible fish, though 
its flesh is full of slender ribs. They say that it was 
sent by its piscine associates to a far country with 
man}" messages, and as an aid to its memory, each fish 
with its commission gave it a rib ; being, however, made 
prisoner on the way, the messages were never delivered, 
and the memorial ribs remained therefore in the bodies 
of the fish and of its progeny. 
The White-bait of China {Salanx Kecvesii) is a 
delicate, pale, semitransparent fish of this family, which 
makes its appearance with other luxuries on the break- 
fast tables of European residents in the East. The 
species of PceciUirichthys inhabiting the rivers of Trini- 
dad are there called “ Sardines,” and the Curirnati are 
termed “ Silver-fish.” 
Family XI.— SCOPELIDANS.— Plate 3, fig. 16. 
This group consists of scaly or scaleless fishes with 
most generally an adipose fin, which in some is so 
tender as to disappear during life. The mouth is 
bounded above by the premaxillaries, that extend 
from corner to corner, the maxillaries lying behind .; 
but in a few genera touching the angle of the mouth. 
Pseudobrancbise are present, and the swim-bladder 
is generally absent. The eggs, which are large 
and single, are discharged througli an ovarian tube, 
instead of falling loose into the cavity of the belly, as 
in the Salmonoids. Muller separated the Scopelidce 
from the Characinidce ; but the characters he at first 
relied upon were not found on further investigation of 
the species to be sufficiently constant, and they are 
generally now comprised in one family. As we have 
grouped them, the Scopelidans have the upper lip more 
completely formed by the premaxillaries than the 
Salmonoids and the Characinoids, large mouths, and a 
kind of family aspect. Several genera connect both 
groups, on the one side to the Clnpeoids, and on the 
other to the Salmonoids. 
The genera are — Argyrnpelecus; Siernopfyx; Odontostormis ; 
Scopelus; Smtrvs; Saurida; Farionella ; Aulopus; Paralepis; 
Alepisaurus; together with Mauroleius; Ichthyocociis; Chloroph- 
thalmns; and some others of the Mediterranean ichthyologists, 
comprised in the Cuvieran genus Scopelus. 
The Kowtoo of the Chinese, or “Dog’s-guts” (Savrus 
ophiodon), or the Nehar of the Gangetic fishermen, is 
fished in vast numbers on the Malabar coast, at the 
mouths of the Ganges, at Canton, and Chusan. The 
Hindostanees eat it fresh, and when salted it appears on 
