7 1 TELEOSTEI CHAP. 



of Blennius occur in abundance on our coasts, and are among the 

 most familiar tenants of small rock-pools. Their habits have 

 been admirably described by Guitel. 1 The male makes a sort of 

 nest, and defends the brood. Numerous species of the genus 

 Salarias occur in the tropics ; these little fish, as their name 

 implies, are remarkable for the long leaps they are able to make. 

 The largest of the Blenniids are the " Wolf-Fishes," often named 

 " Cat-Fishes " (Anarrhichas), of which one species (A. lupus} is 

 common on the British coasts, growing to a length of 5 or 6 

 feet. " It is impossible," says Brown Goode, " to imagine a more 

 voracious-looking animal than the Sea Cat-Fish, with the massive 

 head and long sinuous, muscular body, its strongly rayed fins, its 

 vice-like jaws, armed with great pavements of teeth, those in 

 front long, strong, pointed, like those of a tiger. It has been 

 known to attack furiously persons wading at low tide among the 

 rock-pools." Its flesh is excellent eating, but generally despised 

 in this country owing to the unprepossessing appearance of the 

 animal. 



Fam. 10. Batrachidae. Suborbital arch absent; basis 

 cranii simple ; mouth very large, slightly protractile, bordered 

 to a great extent by the maxillaries. Vertebrae numerous, 

 29-46 (11-12 + 1*7-34), without ribs, with sessile epipleurals, 

 simulating ribs ; 2 parapophyses rudimentary or absent. Post- 

 temporal small and ankylosed to the skull ; scapula and coracoid 

 much reduced, 4 or 5 elongate pterygials, dilated distally, the 

 two lower in contact with the coracoid. Ventral fins jugular, 

 with 1 spine and 2 or 3 branched rays. Gill-openings narrow, 

 the gill -membranes broadly grown to the isthmus; gills 3; 

 pseudobranchiae absent. Head broad and depressed ; body naked 

 or with small scales. Spinous dorsal very short, soft dorsal and 

 anal long. 



This family is on the whole intermediate between the 

 Blenniidae and the Pediculati. Sluggish, voracious, carnivorous 

 Fishes from the shores of tropical and warm seas, some of them 

 ascending rivers. The species number about 20, referable to 



1 Arch. Zool. Exper. (3) i. 1893, p. 325. 



2 What has been described as the rib of the first vertebra is an ossified liga- 

 ment, probably homologous with the first epipleural, which extends from the 

 clavicle to the neural arch of the first vertebra (ligamentum scapulo-occipitale of 

 Siebenrock). 



