78 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ACADEMY OF 



western boundary Survey, at Washington Territory, and will be fully described 

 and figured in the report on the fishes collected by the naturalists of that expe- 

 dition. 



The next form noticed was also claimed to be most worthy of attention on 

 account of the singular combination of characters which it presented, and 

 which might render even the family to which it belongs a question of doubt. 

 Yet the resemblance to the genus Genyoroge of Cantor or Diacope of Cuvier was 

 so very great, that the speaker affirmed there was positively no external char- 

 acter to distinguish them as genera except the position of the anterior nostrils. 

 Those nostrils, in the fish under consideration, were short tubes present at the 

 margin of the snout; that character was very characteristic, and by it the -e- 

 nus was easily distinguished from all other allied forms. 



On examining the dentition and the branchiostegal membrane, remarkable 

 differences are also found between it and the Lutjaninas. The former have a 

 dentition much like that of Serranus, but the new fish was said to have more or 

 less blunt conical teeth, like the Pagrine Sparoids, both on the jaws and the vomer. 

 There were no palatine teeth. In each jaw there are four large and robust teeth 

 in front ; behind, there is a row of smaller ones : behind the row of the upper 

 jaw, is at least one row of smaller molar or pisiform ones, and behind the cor- 

 responding row of the lower, there is, on each side, one molar. There are also 

 three short and very obtuse conical molars on the front of the vomer. Only 

 five branchiostegal rajs could be detected on each side. 



The speaker alluded to this form, as affording additional evidence of the in- 

 timate connection that exists between the Percoidsand the Sparoids, and added, 

 that if the armature of the preoperculum and the dentition of the vomer were 

 not taken into account, it might with almost equal propriety be referred to the 

 Sparoids or the Percoids. Dr. Giinther, by admitting the Pimelepterina in the 

 family of Sparoids, has refused to acknowledge the presence or absence of 

 teeth on the palatine arch as a character of family value in those fishes, and 

 with his limitation the present genus would belong to that family. But the 

 speaker preferred to regard it as the type of a distinct sub-family, intermediate 

 between the Lutjaninse and the Pagrinae, and named it Hoplopagrinre. The 

 genus was called Hoplopagrus. The speaker promised to describe the species 

 hereafter, and in testimony of his appreciation of the advances rendered by 

 Dr. Giinther towards a more natural classification of the Sparoids, Pristipoma- 

 toids and allied groups, would dedicate it to that gentleman. 



In connection with the subject, the cases of the genera II aploidinotus, Corvina, 

 and Rhinoscion were alluded to. The resemblance between the first and last 

 two genera was very strong. That between Ilaploidinohis and Corvina was in- 

 deed so great, that there were no external characters which alone would be suf- 

 ficient to justify their separation as even genera ; but an examination of the 

 pharyngeal bones demonstrates that they are not even members of the same 

 natural sub-family. Rhinoscion, established for the Amblodon salurnus of Gira.r(l, 

 affords a less close analogical resemblance to II aploidinotus. 



Mr. Gill also corrected an erroneous reference to a genus made in the 

 catalogue of the fishes of the eastern coast of North America. He had there 

 referred the three American species of the Monacanthi of Cuvier to the genus Can- 

 therines or Canthorhinus of Swainson, not daring without further evidence to 

 propose for them a distinct one. Having since been able to examine the des- 

 cription of the species given in the zoology of Freycinet's voyage in the libra- 

 ry of the Academy, he found that our species were generically different, and 

 proposed to confer on them the name of Stephanolepis, in allusion to the 

 crown-like crest with which the central part of each scale is adorned. The 

 Monacanthus setifer of Bennett may be considered as the type. The speaker had 

 never seen specimens of the Monacanthus broccus of Dekay, and could not say 

 whether it was congeneric with the other two species or not. 



[April, 



