NATURAL SCIENCES OF PHILADELPHIA. 131 



Head Length (S inches) 100 



Height at preoperculum 40 



Width " " 22 



Eyes Distance from snout 43 



Diameter of eye 18 



Lower jaw Length 75 



Greatest height 10 



Intermaxillary hones Length of posterior processes 12 



Operculum Length of upper margin 29 



Greatest length 33 



Height 18 



Iufraoperculum Length 30 



Length of shortest ray ahove the superior longi- 

 tudinal ridge 12 



Length of its angular processes about 22 



Teeth Length of posterior vomerine tooth 14V 



Width " " " 3| 



Length of largest dentary tooth 9 



Width " " " 3 



The present species differs from the Caul opus boreahs by the oblong opercu- 

 lum, the nearly equal triangular shape of the coalescent infraopercular bone 

 above the dividing ridge, but with an oblique excavation at its base which 

 describes nearly the third of a circle, as well as the sculpture of the portion 

 below the dividing ridge. The vomerine teeth are stronger but less elongated, 

 and the palatine approximated and not curved. 



This fish was discovered at Monterey, Lower California, by Mr. A. S. Taylor, 

 and the head as well as the caudal and ventral fins, all considerably mutilated 

 and "sun-dried," were preserved and forwarded to the Smithsonian Institu- 

 tion, in whose museum they are now contained. The notes of Mr. Taylor 

 describe it as an "eel-like fish," "shaped something like a Barra30uta" 

 (Sphyrana) and apparently "a female (?)" It was " caught near Monterey 

 Rocks, 19 April, 1859." Its weight was seven pounds ; the length "from 

 snout to end of tail four feet," circumference round the belly seven inches ;" 

 it had "simple viscera; the gall bladder, three inches long, was filled with 

 transparent green gall ; it had two simple straight guts ; the female (?) organs 

 of the roe (not impregnated) white and four inches long." It was " evidently 

 in very poor condition." 



The species is "called ' serra,' or saw fish, by the Lower Californians, but 

 it is a very rare species." The specific name given to it has the advantage 

 of at the same time perpetuating the popular name and of being classical and 

 describing one of the peculiarities of the palatine dentition, which distin- 

 guishes it from the A. (C.) borealis. 



Alepidosaukus (Caulopus) Poeyi Gill. 



A species at least very nearly related to the A. (C.) serra, is found in the 

 Caribbean Sea. It has been noticed in M. Poey's " Conspectus Piscium Cuben- 

 sium" as perhaps a new species, or, perhaps, the other sex (sp. nova? an 

 sexus alter?; of his Alepisaurus altivelis. That professor has kindly sent to 

 me outlines of both the Alepisaurus altivelis and the doubtful form, and I find 

 that the dimensions of the latter and the present almost exactly agree in the 

 height of the head, length of the snout, size of the eyes, and depth of the lower 

 jaw. There appears, however, if full reliance is to be placed in the figure^ to 

 be some difference in the opercular bones, that portion of the coalescent, in- 

 ferior, opercular piece, which is above the longitudinal dividing ridge, being 

 much wider towards the. upper angle of the preoperculum, and not deeply 

 excavated on its oblique base, thus approaching the A. (C.) borealis; the 

 operculum itself appears to be less long, its longest ray being little more than 



1862.] 



