448 



TELEOSTEI 



Family GOBIIDAE. The dorsal fin has a separate soft hinder portion ; 

 the anterior portion is supported by flexible spines, and may be reduced. 

 The dentition and scaling varies ; the scales may be smooth, ctenoid, or 

 absent. There is no lateral line, and usually a large anal papilla. 



Periophthalmus is modified for progression on land, and has powerful 

 pectoral tins, and protruding eyes brought up on to the top of the head. 

 Fossil forms have not yet been determined with certainty. Marine and 

 freshwater, widely distributed. 



Gobius, Art. ; widely distributed. Eleotris, Gron. ; freshwater, tropics. 

 Benthophiius, Eisch. ; Caspian. Periophthalmns, Schn. ; tropics. 



TRIBE 3. ECHENEIDIFORMES (Discocephali). 



Distinguished by the extraordinary modification of the separate 

 anterior dorsal fin, which extends on to the head as far as the snout, and 

 becomes flattened out into an oval sucking disc with transverse ridges, 



FIG. 404. 

 Remora brachyptera, Lowe. (From Jordan and Everniann.) 



strengthened by a double series of serrated plates seemingly the modified 

 lepidotrichia (Figs. 464-5) (Storms [427]). The skull is correspondingly 

 flattened, its bones are deeply sunk and smooth, and there is no eye-muscle 



Sucking disc of Bemofa brachyptera, Lowe. Dorsal view. (From Jonlan and Everniann.) 



canal. The supraelavicle is reduced. The scapula perforate, and three 

 radials rest on the coracoid. Already in the Eocene fully differentiated 

 representatives of this family are found. It appears to have no close 

 affinity to the Scombriformes, with which it was long associated. 



