. Cuvier's animal kingdom : arranged according to its organization. Animals. MALACOPTERYGII SUB-BRACIIIATI. 321. Notopterus. Gill-lids and cheeks scaly; the suborbitals, pre-operculum, and operculum have two crests ; the lower jaw is keeled, the belly toothed, and the palatals and jaws have fine teeth ; the upper jaw formed in great part of the maxillaries. Tlieir tongue is set with strong crooked teeth ; they have one strong and bony gill-ray ; ventrals hardly visible, followed by a long anal, which occupies three-fourths of the length, and is united, as in Gtimnotus, with the fins of the tai
. Cuvier's animal kingdom : arranged according to its organization. Animals. MALACOPTERYGII SUB-BRACIIIATI. 321. Notopterus. Gill-lids and cheeks scaly; the suborbitals, pre-operculum, and operculum have two crests ; the lower jaw is keeled, the belly toothed, and the palatals and jaws have fine teeth ; the upper jaw formed in great part of the maxillaries. Tlieir tongue is set with strong crooked teeth ; they have one strong and bony gill-ray ; ventrals hardly visible, followed by a long anal, which occupies three-fourths of the length, and is united, as in Gtimnotus, with the fins of the tail and back; opposite the middle of the anal there is a small dorsal with soft rays. They are found in the stagnant fresh waters of India, being the Gymnotus notopterm of Pallas. Engraidis, the Anchovies, distinguished from the Herrings by the mouth being more deeply cleft, the gill-openings wider, and ten or twelve gill-rays. The small intermaxillaries are fixed under a little pointed snout, in advance of the mouth, and the maxillaries are long and straight. E. enchrasicho- Fig. 1J3.—The Anchovy. lits, the Common Anchovy, so well known for its rich and peculiar flavour, is about a span long, bluish above, silvery below, the abdomen not trenchant, the anal short, and the dorsal over the ventrals. Taken in vast numbers in the Mediterranean, and less abundantly in the ocean. E. meletta is a Mediterranean species. E. edentulus, an American species, without teeth. Thryssa, differs from the Anchovies in having the belly toothed, and the maxillaries very long. It is an East Indian subgenus. Megalops. Fins and jaws generally formed like those of the Herring, but the belly not trenchant, nor the body compressed ; teeth in the jaws and palate very small and numerous ; from twenty-one to twenty-four gill-rays ; and the last ray of the dorsal, and often of the anal, extended in a filament. One American species, the Apalite, is found twelve feet long, has fifteen rays in the dorsal, and a
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