18 LABRAX LINEATUS. 



Perca saxatilis, Schneid., ed. Block, Iclitli., p. 89 ; id. P. septentrionalis, p. 90, pi. 20. 



Centropome raye, Lacep., Hist. Nat. Poiss., torn. iv. p. 225. 



Perca Mitchilli, Mitch., Trans. Lit. and Phil. Soc. N. Y., vol. i. p. 413, pi. 3, fig. 4. 



Eock-fish, Mease, Trans. Lit. and Phil. Soc. N. Y., vol. i. p. 502. 



Labrax lineatus, Cuv. et Vol., Hist. Nat. Poiss., torn. ii. p. 79. 



Labrax lineatus, Rich., Faun. Boreal. Am., iii. p. 10. 



Labrax lineatus, Slorer, Report, &c., p. 7. 



Labrax lineatus, Ayres, Host. Jour. Nat. Hist., vol. iv. p. 257. 



Labrax lineatus, DeKay, Zool. N. Y., part iv. p. 7, pi. 1, fig. 3. 



Labrax lineatus, Slorer, Synops., &c., p. 21. 



Rock- fish, Vulgo. 



Description. The body is elongated, sub-cylindrical, moderately compressed, 

 with the dorsal outline regularly, though gently, arched ; it is thin along the back, 

 and almost carinated in front of the dorsal fin ; the ventral line is less arched 

 than the dorsal, and the fish is thicker at the belly than along the back, but its 

 thickest part is near the lateral line. The head is large, long, thick, and very 

 broad between the eyes, where it is so depressed as to make the facial outline 

 slightly concave. The snout is very full and rounded. The nostrils are closely 

 approximated, and much nearer to the orbit than to the snout ; they are about 

 the median plane of the eye, and on a line Avithin the orbit ; the posterior is 

 larger and sub-oval ; the anterior is round. The eye is very large, rather longest 

 horizontally, and is one diameter and one eighth of the orbit from the snout, and 

 three diameters and a quarter from the angle of the opercle, with its inferior mar- 

 gin about the median plane of the head. 



The mouth is large, though the upper jaw extends only to the middle of the 

 orbit ; the lips are tolerably thick and fleshy ; the lower jaw is longer than the 

 upper, and both are armed with numerous small, villiform, pointed, slightly re- 

 curved and card-like or closely set teeth ; they are nearly of the same size in both 

 jaws, but those of the outer row in the inter-maxillary bone are rather largest. The 

 palate-bones have each a long, slender patch of minute teeth, and the vomer an 

 angular group in front. There are two bands of minute teeth, at the root of the 

 tongue, separated slightly from each other in the mesial line ; the sides of the 



