Zoology.} NATURAL HISTORY OF VICTORIA. [_Fishes. 



Plate 193. 



NEOSEBASTES SCORP^NOIDES (Guich.). 

 The Spotted Red Gurnet-Perch. 



[Genus NEOSEBASTES (Guichenot). (Sub-kingdom Vetebrata. Class Pisces. Sub- 

 class Teleostea. Order Acanthopterygii. Family Scorpsenidas.)' 



Oen. Char. — Resembling Sebastes, but no scales on vertical fins, and having lower rays of 

 pectoral branched and not elongated. Head large, spinous, and tuberculated, but less so than 

 in Scor2}(ena; head and body entirely covered with rough scales ; no fleshy filaments from head. 

 One dorsal ; seven branchiostegal rays. Teeth in villiform bands on jaw, vomer, and palatines.] 



D. 13 + 8*; A. 3 + 6; V. 1 + 5; P. 22; C. lof. L.l. i8^% under third 

 dorsal spine; ^ about middle of body under eighth dorsal spine. 



Description. — Form: Ovate, moderately elongate and compressed, profile of 

 head sloping rapidly from second spine of dorsal (corresponding to the greatest 

 depth) to snout, broken by the projection of nearly one-third the diameter of the 

 very large oval eye; the ocular projections slope to a very deep, smooth channel 

 between the eyes. Gape slightly oblique; lower jaw slightly projecting in front of 

 upper when mouth closed, with a conspicuous Icnob under its symphysis, and a large 

 rounded pore on each side. Nostrils large; a strong spine near inner margin of 

 anterior one. Superciliary ridge with three, gradually increasing, compressed spines, 

 the posterior one largest. A slight, transverse, smooth furrow behind the eyes. 

 One long, ridge-Hke, compressed spine, increasing in height to posterior end on each 

 side of nape, beginning in line with posterior edge of orbit; a similar spine, 

 compressed, ridge-like, with two posterior points on stay from edge of orbit to 

 edge of preoperculum ; two similar, compressed, spinous ridges in one line, each 

 with two compressed spinous points, near posterior end, extending from anterior 

 fourth of orbit longitudinally nearly to edge of preoperculum on suborbital; one-fifth 

 the diameter of the orbit below its edge. Preoperculum extending in a large com- 

 pressed spine, continuing its angle near to edge of operculum a little above base of 

 pectoral; a smaller sharp spine below; and three broad, triangular, lobe-like spines 

 at equidistant intervals extended to its lower edge. Operculum with a strong, ridged 

 spine extending upwards and backwards along upper arched edge; a second, longer, 

 ridged spine in a line from middle of eye, directed backwards, nearly reaching edge 

 of operculum. The lachrymal bone or preorbital at lower edge has a broad, trisulcate, 

 three-pointed spine in front overlapping the intermaxillary bone, and four sharp, 

 conical spines behind directed downwards and backwards at upper edge of 

 maxillary. Greatest depth between second and third spines of dorsal, equal to about 

 one-third the length of the body without the caudal fin; thickness of the body about 

 two-thirds the depth; length of the head about two and two-thirds in total length, 

 excluding caudal fin; length of head about one-sixth more than the depth of the 

 body ; profile of back sloping with slight convexity to end of dorsal, moderately 

 constricted thence to caudal fin; ventral profile more convex to origin of anal, 



* It is, no doubt, by slip of the pen tbat M. Guichenot puts IS as the number of soft rays in the doisal. 

 Vol. II.— Decade XX— 36. [ 337 ] 



