334 DESCRIPTIVE CATALOGUE OF AUSTRALIAN FISHES, 



beneath the posterior third of the eye, and is truncate. The 

 nostrils are large, contiguous, and immediately in front of the 

 eye, the snout entirely scaly, operculum with two flat obtuse lips; 

 suprascapula not visible. Caudal fin truncate with slightly 

 convex angle ; the first four or five rays of the dorsal fin longer 

 than the others, the fourth elongate. Back more or less distinctly 

 spotted with black. 



West Australia. Length thirty-one inches. 



68. Glaucosoma scapulare, Eamsay, (M.SS.) 



[Plate 13.] 



B. 8. D. 8/11. A. 3/9. L. lat. 50. L. transv. 11/20. 



Form oblong, compressed ; the height of the body is one-third 

 of the total length, the length of the head a little less ; the eye 

 is very large, the diameter of the orbit being one-fourth of the 

 length of the head, equal to its distance from the extremity of 

 the upper jaw, and greater than the width of the interorbital 

 space, which is convex transversely. The nostrils are large, 

 placed immediately in front of the eyes, and almost contiguous, 

 the posterior one the largest. Teeth in the jaws short, strong, 

 pointed and a little curved, placed in two tolerably regular rows 

 on the edge of the bone, the exterior row in the upper jaw, and 

 the interior in the lower being the largest ; teeth of the same 

 description but smaller on an elevated ridge on the vomer and 

 palatine bones ; all the rest of the mouth and the tongue densely 

 clothed with very minute villiform teeth ; no canines. The 

 profile of the head descends in a gentle curve to the front of the 

 eyes opposite the nostrils where there is a slight concavity, it 

 then bulges out towards the snout, which is truncate at its 

 extremity. The cleft of the mouth is oblique, the lower jaw is 

 considerably longer than the upper, but shuts into it, the rather 

 swollen extremity of the lower jaw being received into a toothless 

 space in the centre of the upper. The maxillary bone is large 

 and triangular, and reaches backwards nearly to the vertical from 



