PR0CEEDING8 OF UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 63 



III. 

 CONCLUSIONS. 



It will be seen that naturalists bad apparently settled down within 

 the last few years to a consideration of the Saccopliaryngidai as a type 

 of fishes having no exceptional characters, or even, in the words of Dr. 

 Giinther, hs being simply "deep-sea congers," and yet, when we study 

 the works of the older authors, from whom we would naturally expect 

 to glean little inlormation to correct the later ones, we find a number 

 of remarkable characters alluded to. Such are, (1) the general form and 

 the relations of the parts to each other, for which the Saccopharyn- 

 gidffi are so peculiar, therein differing very widely from all the true eels; 

 (2) the head, which was specifically described by Dr. Mitchill as be- 

 ing " smaller than is usual in fish"; the lower jaw, indicated by the old 

 authors as (3) having its rami not only very movable and divergible from 

 each other, but as (4) also being itself capable of anteridr and back- 

 ward extension ; (5) the tongue, which was declared to be entirely ab- 

 sent ; (6) the branchiostegal bones also, in the most i^ositive terms, said 

 to be absolutely wanting; (7) the gills, alleged to be visible in a certain 

 peculiar manner through the branchial apertures; (8) the i^ectorals, 

 stated by one of them at least to have a very exceptional structure, and 

 to present an appearance of being composed of an adipose disk, bounded 

 posteriorly by the rays; and (9) the vertebral column, specifically stated, 

 " in its progress to the tail, to lose its bones and be converted into a sort 

 of tough and grisly ai)i)endage." All these characters are so extraordi- 

 nary and deviate so much from any exemplified in true apodal fishes, 

 that it might seem inevitable that the attention of any scientific ichthy- 

 ologist at the present day would be specially arrested by such attributes, 

 and that an examination of the form would be provoked on the part of 

 any one having access to specimens. And yet it will be noticed that 

 Dr. Giinther, in his Catalogue published in 1872, as well as in his Intro- 

 duction to the Study of Fishes, published as late as 1880, absolutely ig- 

 nores all of the characters thus adverted to, and from his description no 

 one would suppose that the fishes in question had any anomalous char- 

 acters, or were especially noticeable on account of structural modifica- 

 tions. 



IV. 



SYNOPSIS. 



Saccopharyngidee. 



= Saccopharyngoidei, Bleeker, Enum. sp. Piscium Arcliipel. lud,, p. xxxiii. (Not 

 characterized : isolated as the only representative of a distinct tribe 

 — Saccopharyu<;ichthyiui — of the " ordo 49, MurfcniP," which latter is 

 co-ordinate with the "ordo 48, Synbranchi".) 1859. 



^MurteuidJB Saccopharyngioa, Giinther, Cat. Fishes in Brit. Mus., v. 8, pp.19, 22. 



1870. 



