rank amongft Fifties, and has inftituted for it the 
genus Gafirobranchus . It is remarkable that a very 
different animal has by Linnaeus and others been 
confounded with it : viz. a fmall fpecies of Petro- 
myzon or Lamprey ; (Lampetra casca. Will, ichth.) 
The figure alfo in the Britifh Zoology is, according 
to Dr. Bloch, by no means the Gafirobranchus, 
(Myxine glutinofa, Lin.) but the above-mentioned 
Tmall fpecies of Petromyzon. Linnaeus and others 
have alfo defcribed the Gafirobranchus (Myxine) 
as feldom exceeding the length of a few inches ; 
yet in the Britifh Mufeum is a fpecimen not lefs than 
a middle-fized eel: and in a collection of drawings 
of South-Sea animals in the poffeflion of Sir Jofeph 
Banks, a figure occurs of the fame animal at leaft as 
large as a common eel. We may therefore conclude 
that it varies very greatly in fize, and that the Eu¬ 
ropean fpecimens fall far fliort of the Antarctic ones. 
When placed in a veffel of fea water this fifli foon 
renders it gelatinous, being of an uncommonly glu¬ 
tinous nature. It is found in the Mediterranean and 
the northern Teas, as well as in thofe of the fouthern 
hemifphere. It is entirely deftitute of eyes, which 
feems to have been the reafon of Linnaeus and others 
having confounded it with the Lampetra caeca of 
Willughby above mentioned, in which fifli however 
there are eyes, though very fmall ones. 
It muft be unneceflary to add that the genus 
Myxine amongft the Vermes muft be now exploded; 
the animal belonging, as we have feen, to the divifion 
of Cartilaginous Fillies, or Nantes of Linnaeus. 
The 
