194 GADID.E. 



British Fishes, vol. ii. p. 201. This fisli is chiefly characterized by its 

 long ventral beards or rays, which arc twice the length of the head, and 

 by the high and pointed first dorsal fin, which resembles in shape and 

 elevation that of P. Yarrellii, t. vii. supra, but is ten-rayed. 



Shape elongated, thickish forwards at the head and shoulders, much compressed 

 and thin towards the tail : the dorsal fine is nearly straight and horizontal, with a 

 rather abrupt and marked depression at the nape ; the ventral line is rather pro- 

 tuberant, ascending from the commencement of the anal fin. The greatest depth 

 is at about one tliird of the whole length of the fish, or at the origin of the second 

 dorsal fin, and is one fourth of the whole length ; but at the root of the caudal fin 

 it is scarcely one sixteenth of the same. The greatest thickness is from the cheeks 

 nearly to the tip of the pectoral fins, and a little exceeds half the greatest 

 depth. 



The head in length equals the greatest depth. It is small and depressed, or low 

 and flat at the top between the eyes ; and the cheeks behind these are very fleshy, 

 thick, and tumid. The eyes are small and round, with plain flat fleshy orbits : the 

 space between them exceeds but little their diameter, which is from one fifth to one 

 sixth of the length of the head. Sometimes, as in the Cherne, they are spasmodically 

 protruded from their sockets. The mouth and gape are large and wide : the muzzle 

 short, broad, and depressed Uke a frog's : the lower jaw is shorter than the upper, 

 with a short flexible beard at its tip or symphysis beneath. The teeth are small, but 

 sharp, and thick-set in rather broad bands around the edges of both jaws, and in a 

 heart-shaped patch upon the vomer; but there are none whatever on the palatines: 

 the rest of the roof of the mouth being, Uke the broad and thin or flattened tongue, 

 quite smooth. 



The whole head is quite plain and unarmed. The edge of the opercle is thin 

 and membranous, and that of the preopercle is covered and concealed by the skin. 

 The humeral bones are also indiscernible externally. 



The pectoral fins are oblongo-spatulate or ear-shaped, rounded at the tips,* rather 

 small or narrow, and placed halfway up the side. They are in length about one 

 seventh of the whole length of the fish. 



The ventral fins consist each of a single forked and fleshy compressed filament, 

 placed considerably before the pectoral fins low down on the throat, halfway 

 between the base of the pectoral fins and the eye. They are a little longer than 

 the head. 



The first dorsal fin is placed forward, beginning over the upper or anterior end of 

 the base of the pectoral fins. It is small, low, and triangular, with the tip or apex 

 rounded and not pointed. Its height about equals the length of its base ; and the 

 third and three following rays are the longest. 



The second dorsal fin begins close behind the first, and continues of nearly equal 

 height or breadth, with a straight and even edge, to the root of the caudal fin. Its 

 height does not exceed that of the first dorsal fin ; being from one third to one 

 fourth of the gi-eatest depth of the body. 



The anal fin commences a little behind a point opposite to the origin of the 

 second dorsal, with which it corresponds in every other respect, being only a little 

 narrower. 



The caudal fin is small, and fan or wedge-shaped. 



All the fins are soft and fleshy or rather leathery, with the rays indistinct, or 

 obsolete. The dorsal and anal fins are very thick and fleshy at their base. 



* By an error in engraving, they are incorrectly represented to be pointed in the accompanying 

 figure. Their fonn is better given by Salviani or Willughby : but still not quite correctly. 



