578 PROCEEDINGS OF UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



General form of A. notospilotus, the body rather robust; the head 

 large and broad. Lower jaw included. Maxillary extending to poste- 

 rior part of eye, 2\ in head. Eyes rather large, 5 in head, about one- 

 third broader than the concave interorbital space. Nasal spines strong, 

 with a conspicuous cirrus behind them. Top of head less depressed 

 and less concave than in A. notospilotus ; its lateral ridges smooth and 

 covered by skin, without spine-like projections. No tubercular promi- 

 nences behind eye. Preopercle ending in a short process, which has 

 usually three spines at its tip, the two uppermost hooked upward. 

 The three prominences below this spine are small, entire, covered with, 

 smooth skin. (In A. notospilotus these projections are much larger, and 

 more or less coarsely serrate.) A few small dermal flaps on top and 

 sides of head. Head with small stellate, non-imbricate scales, arranged 

 much as in A. notospilotus, but extending lower on the sides of the head, 

 covering the suborbital and postorbital regions, as far down as the sub- 

 orbital stay. Scales on body cup-shaped, arranged, as in A. notospilotus, 

 in a broad band along each side of the back; each band about 9 scales 

 in breadth. This band extends much further back than in A. notospi- 

 lotus, meeting its fellow across the back of the tail behind the dorsal 

 fin. A small but distinct pore-like slit behind the fourth gill (wholly 

 wanting in A. notospilotus). 



Fins low, the dorsal much lower than in A. notospilotus; the longest 

 dorsal spine about equal to snout ; 3J in head (in the female), probably 

 higher i^ the males. Yentrals about reaching vent; pectorals past 

 front of anal. 



Color, in spirits, essentially as in A. notospilotus, bat paler ; olivaceous, 

 the head mottled and barred with blackish ; back with about 4 saddle- 

 like black bars. Base of caudal blackish. Fins all, except the ventrals, 

 which are pale (i>robably dusky in males), with cross-bars and series of 

 spots. A black blotch bordered by orange between iirst and second 

 dorsal spines, and another between 7th and 8th. 



This species is evidently the northern representative of Artedius no- 

 tospilotus, but has apparently become so thoroughly differentiiited from 

 the latter as to be worthy of a distinct spocitic name. In A. notospilotus, 

 the head is more uneven, the body and head less completely scaled, the 

 fins larger, the armature of the i)reopercle different, and especially 

 there is no trace of slit behind the last gill. 



Several specimens of this species were obtained by the writers in 

 Commencement Bay, near New Tacoma, Washington Territory, in 

 June, 1880. These are numbered 27206 and 2714G, and some of them 

 have been distributed by the National Museum as ^^ Artedius notospi- 

 lotus.^^ The latter species was found by us in abundance only at Santa 

 Barbara. Girard's original types apparently included both species, but 

 his description applies best to the southern form. 



If we include in the §^eni\s Artedius a.\\ the species {lateralis, fenestra- 

 lis, notospilotus, quadriscriatus, j)U(jctfensis, me(iacephalus) from the west 



