64 



BERYCID.E. 



There are twenty-six vertebrae, of which fifteen are caudal, with imperfect 

 approaches towards the formation of a sixteenth. Though all the vertebrae are 

 very short, the first of the eleven abdominal is not peculiarly so. The six last 

 abdominal are fumished with apophyses beneath ; those of the four last being 

 united at the base into a thick stalk, forked at the apex. The first interspinal 

 of the anal fin is applied to the inferior apophysis of the first caudal vertebra. 

 The two first interspinals belonging to the dorsal fin, are both received between 

 the superior apophyses of the second and third cervical or abdominal vertebrae : 

 but the rest behind alternate regularly with the superior apophyses : and there 

 are two interspinals before the dorsal fin without rays or external indications ; 

 the first applied to the front point of the superior apophysis of the first vertebrae ; 

 the second inserted between the points of the first and second. 



A most curious analogy, to say the least, exists between Trachichthys 

 and the extraordinary Azorian Sternoptyx Olfersn, Cuv. R. Anim. ii. 

 316, t. 13. f . 2 ; a fish which has been evidently placed improperly in 

 the same genus with the tropical West Indian Sternoptyx Hermarmii, 

 and which might be appropriately called Pleurothyris^ Olfersii. The 

 shape, large eye, peculiar tooth at the hinder end of the branches of 

 the lower jaw, the double border of the preopercle, the thinness and 

 partial transparency of the flanks and belly, j- in Avhich it approximates 

 to the true Sternoptyx Hermaimii, and the form lastly of the fins, 

 all correspond. But above all, the peculiar plates of the abdominal keel 

 in Trachichthys have their perfect counterpart or representation, even 

 in number, in the plaits or pits which suggested first the name Sterno- 



system of Fishes, and which at the same time, before the principle was recognised, led to so many 

 forced analogies on the part of those Anatomists, who imagined that every bone in the skeleton of 

 a fish had its homologue in the endo-skeleton of the higher Vertebrates. It was the skeleton of the 

 Sturgeon which opened my eyes to the nature of the difficulties of ichthjac osteology : and which 

 clearly indicates the limits between the dermal and the central or vertebral system of bones. All 

 the true vertebrate skeleton in that fish is in its embryonic state of cartilage : all the dermal parts 

 are well ossified. Here you have the opercular system of bones, the suprascapular of Cuvier, and 

 the suborbitals, in their true character of expanded and ossified scales — a part of the same system 

 which is continued along the lateral line — and above the peripheral extremities of the true spinous 

 elements of the vertebrae. Cuvier's liumeral is, according to this view, the true scapular ; his 

 scapular, the suprascapular ; and his suprascapular, one of the anterior scales of the lateral line, 

 to which the opercular system belongs. The suborbital and supratemporal chains of ossicles belong 

 to the same uncertain and variable system. 



" I have taught this doctrine, in opposition to the Geoifroyan views of the opercular bones being 

 the expanded ossicles of the ear, &c. (necessarily flowing from the idea of the whole skeleton of the fish 

 belonging to the true vertebral system) for the last eight years : and I find that Agassiz maintains 

 similar views in one of his recent Numbers of the Poissons Fossilcs. It is the only clue to the 

 intelligibility of the fish's skeleton : and it demoiistrates the soundness of Cuvier's judgment and 

 comparison, that though he had not clearly apprehended the idea, he was not seduced to consider 

 the dermal bones as analogous to parts of the skeleton of the higher Vertebrates (with one or two 

 exceptions) ; but indicated them as peculiar ichthyic dcvelopements." 



* nxiu^k the side, and Sygi; a window. 



i" This is also common to Dcryx ; and, indeed, a thinness of the abdominal p;u"ietcs seems a 

 character of most deep-sea fishes. 



