42 DISCOVERY REPORTS 



No trace of a swimbladder was found in adults of the following species: Gonichthys coccoi (Cocco), 

 Ctenobranchus nigro-ocellatus (Giinther), Diaphus coeruleiis Klunzinger, and Gymnoscopelus braueri 

 (Lonnberg). 



Family Neoscopelidae 



Neoscopelus macrolepidotus Johnson (Text-fig. 24) 



John Murray Expedition St. 145, Maldive Area, 494 m. B.M. Reg. no. 1939.5.24. 475-84. Standard length 

 118 mm. (30-0 x io-o mm.). 



A capacious swimbladder with rounded anterior and tapering posterior extremities runs down the 

 greater part of the upper body-cavity. The lower half of the sac, which is rather thick walled, is 

 invested with pigmented peritoneum. 



Text-fig. 24. Swimbladder of Neoscopelus macrolepidotus, seen (a) from below. In (b) is shown a single rete and lobe 

 of the gas-gland, gg, gas-gland; rm, rete mirabile. (a, x 3-9; b, x 9-3.) 



The gas-gland covers some two-thirds of the floor of the sac and is fed by five massive retia mira- 

 bilia. These originate from a blood-vessel junction, which is found on the right-hand side of the 

 anterior under-surface of the swimbladder. The junction receives a large vein from the hepatic portal 

 system and an artery from the system of vessels on the roof of the stomach. There is also a blood- 

 vessel (probably an artery) running backwards to the junction from the forward end of the swim- 

 bladder. But the fish is so poorly preserved that it is impossible to trace the blood-system with any 

 certainty. 



