4 DISCOVERY REPORTS 



include examples of some species previously unrepresented in the British Museum 

 collection. The following gentlemen were responsible for the collection and preservation 

 of the specimens : Senor Luis A. Lagos, Director-General of Fisheries ; Professor Carlos 

 Oliver Schneider, Director of Conception Museum; and Sehor Pedro Golusda, 

 Inspector of Fisheries at Lautaro. Mr Cavendish Bentinck has also sent a small but 

 valuable series of specimens from Juan Fernandez, which had been made by Dr Juan 

 Lengerich. To all the above-mentioned gentlemen and institutions my thanks are due 

 and are gratefully tendered. Thanks are also due to the members of the Discovery 

 Committee for permission to study these collections and to prepare this report, to 

 Dr C. Tate Regan, F.R.S., for much help and advice given during its preparation, and 

 to Lieut. -Col. W. P. C. Tenison, D.S.O., for the care and skill that he has displayed 

 in the preparation of the illustrations. The colour sketches reproduced on Plate I are 

 the work of Mr E. R. Gunther, who was in charge of the third of the trawling surveys 

 made by the R.R.S. 'William Scoresby'. 



SYSTEMATIC PART 



PETROMYZONIDAE 



Geotria australis, Gray. 



1851, Chondropt., p. 142, pi. ii; Regan, 1911, Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist. (8) vn, p. 197; Lahille, 

 1915, Anal. Mus. Nac. B. Aires, xxvi, p. 370, figs.; Maskell, 1929, Trans. N. Zealand 

 Inst., lx, p. 167, figs. 



Hab. Australia ; New Zealand ; Argentina, Patagonia and Chile. 



No specimens of this species were obtained by the expedition, but Mr Hamilton has 

 sent one to the British Museum, collected by him in the Falkland Islands in 193 1-2. 

 This is 395 mm. in total length, but it is not stated whether it was taken in the sea or 

 in fresh water. I have also seen a young individual, 123 mm. long, from a brook in 

 central Tierra del Fuego. Maskell has demonstrated that there is only one species of 

 Geotria in New Zealand, and that various stages in its life history had formerly been 

 regarded as distinct species. He suggests that this is perhaps the case also in Australia, 

 Tasmania and South America. Direct comparison of South American material of all 

 stages of growth with similar material from Australia and New Zealand is badly 

 required. 



MYXINIDAE 



Most authors have recognized only one species of Myxine from this region, and the 

 inadequacy of many of the descriptions has made it impossible to give complete 

 synonymies for the three species now defined. Lacepede's Muraenoblenna olivacea, 

 from Magellan, is an undoubted Myxine, but cannot be referred with certainty to any 

 of the three species. In 1842, Jenyns described M. australis from specimens collected 

 by the ' Beagle ' in Goree Sound and other parts of Tierra del Fuego, and although he 

 makes no mention of such important characters as the number of teeth and pores, 



