66 RECORDS OF THE AUSTRALIAN MUSEUM. 



Australian coast, and, wh^re so little is known of them, it is 

 advisable that no opportunity should be lost of recording any 

 fresh facts in connection with their distribution and mode of 

 life. 



The genus Schedophilus was originally placed by Giinther among 

 the Coryphcenina, at that time considered to be a Group of the 

 Scombridce, but subsequently accorded family rank. The dis- 

 covery, however, off the Pacific coast of North America of two 

 closely allied forms, induced Professors Jordan and Gilbert to 

 remove these fishes, respectively known as Icosteus enigmaticus 

 and loichthys lockingtoni to a separate family, for which they 

 proposed the name Icosteidee, and in which was included the 

 Bafhy master of Cope, a genus wliich differs in a much greater 

 degree from the typical Icosteus than does Icoateus from a typical 

 Sohedophilm^ which latter genus is apparently omitted entirely 

 from the family ; the words of those authors, after diagnosing 

 the Icosteidce, being : " This group, as at present constituted, is 

 composed of three very diverse genera, each of a single species, 

 inhabiting the deeper waters of the North Pacific. It is probably 

 most nearly related to the Malacanthidce, from which it is dis- 

 tinguished by the presence of pyloric coeca, and by the non-labrid 

 dentition."* 



The formation of a new family for these fishes, and the con- 

 sequent disruption of his Goryphaenidce, does not meet with Dr. 

 Giinther's apjDroval, and he further holds that the splitting up of 

 Cocco's genus is distinctly untenable; he remarks : " I fail to find 

 in the description (of S. lockingtoni) cha,r?icters which would warrant 

 a generic separation from Schedophilus, or the creation of a distinct 

 family Icosteidce."-f With the latter part of this opinion we are 

 entirely in accord, for we cannot consider that such cliaracters as 

 the dentition and the al)sence of pseudobranchiae, however useful 

 in separating genera, can with propriety be applied to the differ- 

 entiation of families. 



With reference to the generic distinctions pointed out by 

 Lockington, Jordan, and Gilbert, we cannot, however, so readily 

 give in our adherence to Dr. Giinther's views ; such characters as 

 the presence or absence of scales, of groups of epidermal spines, 

 and of an airbladderj being of sufticient importance to make us 

 hesitate before declining to accept the genera Icosteus and Icicithys 

 proposed by the American ichthyologists. In this communication 

 we shall, however, include all the known species under the 

 common term Schedophilus, using the other names as signifying 



* Synopsis, p. 619. 

 t Voy. Challenger, xxii. p. 46. 



I This is apparently of less importance, and is of course well known in 

 the true Mackerels. 



