104 PROCEEDINGS OP THE CALIFORNIA 



line of profile, and their greatest diameter is nearly one-third the length of the 

 head. They are placed nearer the origin of the lateral line than the end of the 

 snout. The small maxillary bone extends as far back as the anterior margin of 

 the eye. 



The dorsal fin takes its origin immediately above the posterior limb of the 

 orbit and terminates within one diameter of the eye of the caudal fin. Its three 

 anterior rays are very small, and the fourth, which is the tallest, is one-third as 

 long as the base of the whole fin, or equal to two-thirds the height of the body. 

 Posteriorly the spiny rays rapidly diminish in altitude so that the last one is 

 shorter than the succeeding soft rays. The soft portion of the fin is compara- 

 tively low, gently convex along its upper edge, and is equally as long as the 

 spiny part. The anal fin is small, being inserted just in advance of the middle 

 of the soft portion of the dorsal. Its extreme margin is slightly concave and the 

 rays rapidly diminish in length posteriorly. The ventrals when laid back reach 

 as far as the anal fin. The second simple pectoral ray extends as far back as 

 the vent. The caudal, which is deeply forked, has its lobes rounded off. 



Color greyish-silvery, and ornamented with five oblique blackish-brown bands 

 which are disposed as follows : one extends from the snout to the preopercular 

 margin, the second starts from the eye and terminates on the pectoral base, the 

 third, which passes over the occipital region, extends below the pectoral axilla ; 

 the fourth, which is much broader, starts from the origin of the dorsal fin, curves 

 downward and backward, becoming wider in its descent, and passes beneath the 

 abdomen ; the fifth one commences on the upper anterior half of the spiny 

 dorsal, extending along the back to near the termination of that fin. Three 

 irregular, pale spots may be observed in the dorsal band, and three large black- 

 ish-brown spots on the caudal trunk. The opercular flap and snout tinged with 

 orange-red. The interorbital space is marked with two transverse brownish-red 

 bauds. Irides yellowish-silvery. That portion of the dorsal fin anterior to the fifth 

 band is white, the remainder, together with the anal and caudal, light-yellowish, 

 the latter tipped with blackish-brown. The pectorals are orange-red, and the 

 ventrals are deep blackish-brown. 



Length, 7 inches. 



Habitat, Sandwich Islands. 



Remarks. — An extremely rare fish, of which the solitary specimen now before 

 me is the only example that has come to my notice. It is the more interesting 

 in a geographical point of view, as being the only species — as near as I can 

 ascertain — recorded from the Polynesian Seas. Sir John Richardson, in his 

 interesting " Notices of Australian Fish," published in the " Proceedings of the 

 Zoological Society of London," describes, and gives a list of thirteen species. 

 Nine of those occur in the Australian Seas, one from China and Japan, two 

 from the Cape of Good Hope, and one from Tristan d'Acuuha. In the number 

 and arrangement of the fasciae, our fish closely resembles the C. gibbosus, Sol., 

 (Chaetodon) from Van Piemen's Land. The latter species is less gibbous, the 

 eyes smaller, the soft portion of the dorsal fin shorter, and the caudal forks are 

 more pointed than in the C. vittatus. 



