788 FISHES—SILURID A. 
Habitat, Canada to Florida, Texas and Montana, abundant in all suitable waters east 
of the Alleghanies. 
Diagnosis.—This most abundant species may be known from the other 
white Cat-fishes by the position of the eye, which.is not wholly in ad- 
vance of the middle of the head. | 
Habits —This species ig very abundant in the Ohio River and its larger 
tributaries, and is found, but less frequently, in Lake Erie. It does not 
usually ascend small streams. It is used for food, and is of some value, 
but the flesh is perhaps hardly as good as that of most of the Amiuri. 
The species prefers clear waters, being averse to mud, and is much less 
tenacious of life than the Amur are. Its singular form and silvery 
colors renders it an attractive aquarium fish. 
The idea is prevalent that this is our largest Cat-fish. I find no good 
evidence of the truth of thissupposition. The largest specimens I have 
ever seen would hardly weigh over five or six pounds. And all the large 
“Blue Cats” which have been shown me belong to Amiurus nigricans. I 
have seen the adult of Ichthzlurus punctatus put on the hook as “live 
bait,” to attract Amiurus nigricans, at Cumberland Falls, in Kentucky. 
Genus 11. AMIURUS. Rafinesque. 
Silurus et Pimelodus sp., LINNZUS, and all writers prior to 1802. 
Ameiurus, RAFINESQUE (1820), Ich. Ohiensis, 65 (as section under sub-genus Ictalurus of 
Pimelodus.) 
Amiurus, GILL (1862), Proc. Bost. Sec. Nat. Hist., 50, and of recent writers generally. 
Ameurus, Cork (1864), Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila. 1) eo. 
Gronias, CopE (1864), Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila., 231. 
Type, Silurus cupreus, Rafinesque. 
Etymology, a, privitive; meiourus, curtailed, in allusion to the entire caudal fin. 
Body moderately elongated, robust, anteriorly vertically ovate, and scarcely com- 
pressed ; caudal peduncle also robust, but much compressed, and at its end evenly con- 
vex. 
Head large, wide, laterally expanded, above ovate and in profile cuneiform ; supra- 
occipital extended little posteriorly and terminating in a more or less acute point, 
which is entirely separate from the second interspinal buckler; the skin covering the 
bones is thick. 
Eyes rather small, in one species covered by the skin; mouth large, terminal, trans- 
verse, the upper jaw in most species the longer; jaws often equal, the lower, in one or 
two species distinctly projecting. 
Teeth subulate, aggregated in broad bands on the intermaxillaries and dentaries; the 
intermaxillary band is convex in front, of equal breadth, and abruptly truncated near 
the insertion of the intermaxillaries ; the lower dental band is anteriorly semicircular, 
attenuated to the angles of the mouth. 
Branchiostegal membrane on each side with eight or nine rays in typical species; ten 
or eleven in two orthree aberrant species; dorsal situated over the interval between 
