CHAP. 16.—HOW MANY KINDS OF FISH THERE ARE.
There are seventy-four[1] species of fishes, exclusive of those
that are covered with crusts; the kinds of which are thirty
in number. We shall, on another occasion,[2] speak of each
individually; but, for the present, we shall treat only of the
nature of the more remarkable ones.
1. Hardouin suggests that the proper reading here is probably 144, because in B. xxxii. c. 51, Pliny speaks of 174 different kinds of fishes, and
here he says that the crustacea are thirty in number. Daubenton speaks
of the species of fishes as being 866 in number, while Lacépede says that
he had examined more than a thousand, but that was far below the real
number. Cuvier mentions specimens of about 6000 kinds of fishes, in the
Cabinet du Roi. Ajasson remarks upon the learned investigations of
Cuvier on this subject, and his researches in Sumatra, Java, Kamschatka,
New Zealand, New Guinea, and elsewhere, for the purpose of increasing
the list of the known kinds of fishes.
2. B. xxx. c. 53.