Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 12.djvu/650

632 632 ICHTHYOLOGY [HISTORY AND hundred and twenty species are thus arranged and described, of which about one hundred and eighty were known to the authors from personal examination, a comparatively small proportion, but descriptions and figures still formed in great measure the substitute for our modern collections and museums. With the increasing accumulation of forms, the want of a fixed nomenclature had become more and more felt. Artedi. Peter Artedi would have been a great ichthyologist if Ray or Willughby had not preceded him. But he was fully conscious of the fact that both had prepared the way for him, and therefore he did not fail to reap every possible advantage from their labours. Born in 1705 in Sweden, he studied with Linnaeus at Upsala; from an early period he devoted himself entirely to the study of fishes, and was engaged in the arrangement and description of the collec tion of Seba, a wealthy Dutchman who had formed what was perhaps the richest museum at that time, when he was accidentally drowned in one of the canals of Amsterdam in the year 1734:, at the age of twenty-nine. His manu scripts were fortunately secured by an Englishman, Count Clifford, and edited by his early friend Linnaeus. The work is divided into the following parts : (1) In the BibliotJicca Ichthyologica Artedi gives a very complete list of all preceding authors who had written on fishes, with a critical analysis of their works. (2) The Philosophia Ichthyologica, is devoted to a description of the external and internal parts of fishes; Artedi fixes a precise terminology for all the various modifi cations of the organs, distinguishing between those characters which determine a genus and such as indicate a species or merely a variety ; in fact he establishes the method and principles which subsequently have guided every systematic ichthyologist. (3) The Genera Piscium contains well-defined diagnoses of forty-five genera, for which he has fixed an unchangeable nomenclature. (4) In the Species Piscium de scriptions of seventy-two species, examined by himself, are given, descriptions which even now are models of exactitude and method. (5) Finally, in the Synonymin Piscium references to all previous authors are arranged for every species, very much in the manner which is adopted in the systematic works of the present day. Artedi has been justly called the Father of Ichthyology. So admirable was his treatment of the subject, that even Linnreus. Linnseus could only modify an 1 acid to it. Indeed, so far as. ichthyology is concerned, Linnaeus has scarcely done any thing beyond applying binominal terms to the species properly described and classified by Artedi. His classifi cation of the genera appears in the 12th edition of the Systema thus : A. Amphibia Nantes. Spiraculis compositis. Fetromyzon, Eaia, Sipalus, Chim;era. Spiraculis solitariis. Lophius, &quot;Acipenser, Cyclopterus, Balistes, Ostracion, Tetrodon, Diodon, Centriscus, Syngnathus, Pegasus. B. Pisces Apodcs. Murana, Gymnotus, Trichiurus, Anarrhichas, Ammodytes, Ophidium, Stromateus, Xiphius. C. Pisces Jugulares. Callionymus, Uranoscopus, Trachinus, Gad us, Blennius. D. Pisces Thoraci-i. Cepola, Echeneis, Coryphrena, Gobius, Cottus, Scorpsena, Zeus, Pleuronectes, Chretodon, Spams, Labrus, Seiama, Perca, Gasterosteus, Scomber, Mullus, Trigla. E. Pisces Abdominales. Cobitis, Anna, Silurus, Tenthis, Lori- caria, Salmo, FistuLiria, Esox, Elops, Argentina, Atherina, Mn^il, Mormyrus, Exoccetus, Polynemus, Clupea, Cyprinus. Two contemporaries of Linnaeus, L. T. Gronow and J. T. Klein, attempted a systematic arrangement of fishes; both had considerable advantages for the study, especially in possessing extensive collections ; but neither exercised any influence on the progress of ichthyology. The works of Artedi and Linna3us led to an activity of research, especially in Scandinavia, Holland, Germany, and England, such as has never been equalled in the history of biological science. Whilst some of the pupils and followers of Linnaeus devoted themselves to the examina tion and study of the fauna of their native countries, others proceeded on voyages of discovery to foreign and distant lands. Of these latter the following may be especially mentioned : O. Fabricius worked out the fauna of Greenland ; Kalm collected in North America, Hasselquist in Egypt and Palestine, Briinnich in the Mediterranean, Osbeck in Java and China, Thunberg in Japan ; Forskal examined and described the fishes of the lied Sea ; Steller, Pallas, S. T. Gmelin, and Giildenstedt traversed nearly the whole of the Russian empire in Europe and Asia. Others attached themselves as naturalists to the celebrated circumnavigators of the list century, such as the two Forsters (father and son) and Solander, who accom panied Cook ; Commerson, who travelled with Bougain ville; and Sonnerat. Numbers of new and remarkable forms were discovered by those men, and the foundation was laid for a knowledge of the geographical distribution of animals. Of those who studied the fishes of their native countries, the most celebrated were Pennant (Great Britain), O. F. Miiller (Denmark), Duhamel (France), Meidinger (Austria), Cornide (Spain), and Parra (Cuba). The mass of materials brought together by those and other zoologists was so great that, not long after the death of Linnaeus, the necessity made itself felt for collecting them in a compendious form. Several compilers under took this task ; they embodied the recent discoveries in new editions of the classical works of Artedi and Linnseus, but, not possessing either a knowledge of the subject or any critical discernment, they only succeeded in burying those noble monuments under a chaotic mass of rubbish. For ichthyology it was fortunate that two men at least, Bloch and Lacepede, made it a subject of prolonged original research. Mark Eliezer Bloch (1723-1799), a physician of Berlin, Bloc had reached the age of fifty-six when he commenced to write on ichthyological subjects. To begin at his time of life a work in which he intended not only to give full de scriptions of the species known to him from specimens or drawings, but also to illustrate each species in a style truly magnificent for his time, was an undertaking the exe cution of which most men would have despaired of. Yet he accomplished not only this task, but even more than he at first contemplated. His work consists of two divisions : (1) Oeconomische Naturgesi hichte der Fische Deutschlands, Berl., 1782-84; (2) Naturgeschichte der ans/dndlschen Fische, Berl., 1785- 95. The first division, which is devoted to a description of the fishes of Germany, is entirely original, and based upon the author s own observations. His descriptions as well as figures were made from nature, and are, with but few exceptions, still serviceable ; indeed many continue to be the best existing in literature. Bloch was less fortunate, and is much less reliable, in his natural history of foreign fishes. For many of the species he had to trust to more or less incorrect drawings and descriptions by travellers ; frequently, also, he was deceived as to the origin of specimens which he acquired by purchase. Hence his accounts contain numerous confusing errors, which it would have been difficult to correct had not nearly the whole of the materials on which his work is based been preserved in the collections at Berlin. After the completion of his great work Bloch occupied himself with systematizing. He prepared a general system of fishes, in which he arranged not only those de scribed in his great work, but also those with which he had afterwards become acquainted from the descriptions of others. The work was ably edited and published after Bloch s death by a philologist, J. G. Schneider, under the title M. E. Blochii Systema ichtliyoloyice iconihus CX. illus- tratum, Berl., 1801. The number of species enumerated in it amounts to 1519. The system is based upon the number of the fins, the various orders being termed Hende-