121 



Snout barely longer than the eye, which is nearly a fourth the length of the 

 head and slightly more than the -width of the interorbital space. Nostrils in a 

 scaleless fossa in front of the eye ; the posterior the larger. 



Mouth wide, the maxilla, which is decidedly more than half as long as the 

 head, reaching the level of the posterior border of the orbit : villiform teeth in 

 bands of moderate breadth in the jaws. 



Barbel slender, from half to nearly two-thirds the length of the head. 



Operculum with two feeble points, which are often subcutaneous and in- 

 distinguishable : angle of preoperculum full and rounded. Very numerous long 

 close-set gill-rakers on the outer side of the first branchial arch. 



Deciduous cycloid scales on the head and body : six rows of them between 

 the last ray of the first dorsal fin and the lateral line. 



First dorsal ray rudimentary, the second is produced to a filament and is 

 about twice as long as the head, or even longer. The longest rays of the 2nd 

 dorsal fin are about as long as the snout and eye combined. 



Upper pectoral ray nearly three times, 'outer ventral ray nearly twice as 

 long as the head. 



About 20 long rather slender pyloric cseca. 



The largest specimen is a little over a foot long. 



Bay of Bengal, off west coast of Andamans, 683 fathoms : Arabian Sea, in 

 the neighbourhood of the Laccadives and Maldives, 459, 636, and 740 fathoms. 



Eegd. Nos. 12860, 12861, 13132, 14004, ^ ^. 



Distribution : Atlantic coasts of N. America ; Atlantic coasts of Morocco ; 

 Arabian Sea and Bay of Bengal ; off Philippine Islands. 



99. Bathygadus furvescens, Alcock. 



Bathygadus furvescens, Alcock, Journ. As. Soc. Bengal, Vol. LXIII. pt. 2, 1894, p. 128 : Illustrations of the 

 Zoology of the Investigator, Fishes, pl. XVI. fig. 1 (first dorsal, upper pectoral and outer ventral rays broken). 



B. 7. D. r + 9-10. P. 15. V. 8. 



Differs from B. longifilis, Goode and Bean, only in the following particulars : — 



Length of head from a fifth to a sixth (young) the total. 



Snout distinctly though not very greatly longer than the eye. 



Major diameter of the eye a fourth (young) to a fifth (adult) the length of 

 the head. 



No barbel. 



Seven rows of scales between the last ray of the first dorsal fin and the 

 lateral hue. 

 16 



