64 



ITagtet det maa erkjendes^ at en Optræden eller Man- 

 gel af Tænder paa Craniets tandbærende Ben lios Fiskene 

 i Regelen kunne aigive Characterer af en afgjørende Be- 

 tydning ved Slægternes Adskillelse. maa dette Forhold hos 

 Lrøwperøts-Gruppen utvivlsomt ansees for at være af mindre 

 Vægt, idet Tandsættet idethele baade er lidet constant, og 

 uden samtidig at være ledsaget af tilsvarende Forskjellig- 

 heder i den øvrige Legemsbygning, der er særdeles over- 

 ensstemmende hos alle Arter. 



Hertil kommer, at de Tiender, der kunne optræde 

 paa Vomer og Palatinbeiiene. ere" uden Undtagelse yderst 

 tine. og i mange Tilladde er det forst efter noje Underso- 

 gelser muligt at paavise deres Tilstedeværelse, selv hos de 

 større Individer. At de paa disse Ben forekommende 

 Tænder ikke kunne være a f nogen sa j rdeles Betydning for 

 Individet, fremgaar alene af den Qmstændighed, at de forst 

 udvikles læiige efter Kjævétænderne (iler aldrig mangle), 

 saaledes at Characterer. hentede af dette Forhold, hos yngre 

 Individer ganske tabe sin Anvendelse. Hos L. medius 

 ere saaledes Palatintænderne enduu umærkelige hos Indi- 

 vider, der ere halvvoxne (eller hvor Totalhengden er under 

 70"""); hos L. maculatus er netop det samme Tilfældet 

 med Vomerin- og Palatintænderne. Det synes saaledes 

 ikke hensigtsmæssigt at tillægge de paa disse Tandforholde 

 hyggede Characterer hos denne Slægt en videre Vægt. end 

 i det højeste til Adskillelse af Underslægter. 



L. medius tilkorer saaledes Slægten Lumpenus i be- 

 grændset Forstand, ligesom L. fabricii fra Spitsbergen og 

 Grønland, samt Pallas's Blennius anguiUaris fra det stille 

 Hav. Overensstemmelsen mellem disse Arter et visselig 

 saa gjennemgaaende. at det bliver ganske unaturligt at hen- 

 føre dem under forskjellige Slægter, saaledes som af Gill 

 og Ayres er forsøgt. For L. medius har (i ill. som oven- 

 for nævnt, i 1864 opstillet Slægten Anisarchus; men den 

 eneste af de Characterer. der skulde kunne have Værdi 

 som Slægtsmærke, nemlig Antallet af Gjællestraaler. hvil- 

 ket opgives at være 7 hos I/umpenus, 6 hos Anisarchus, 

 er ikke fuldkommen constant. Vistnok har Kroyer altid 

 hos sine Exemplarer af L. fabricii fundet 7 Grjællestraa- 

 ler; derimod opgiver baade Fabricius (for sin Blennius 

 lumpenus) 6, og Malmgren har fundet samme Antal idet- 

 mindste hos 3 af sine 4 spitsbergenske Exemplarer. Hos 

 denne Art synes saaledes Gjællestraalernes Antal at variere, 

 og er følgelig ikke skikket til at opstilles som eneste Slægts- 

 ch a ra eter. 



Den første korte Diagnose af L. medius meddeler 

 Reinhardt i 1838 i sin ovennævnte Afhandling om Grøn- 

 lands Fiskefauna. I Giinthers Diagnose i ('at. Fish. Brit. 

 Mus. vol. 3 (1801). der var affattet efter et gronlandsk 

 Individ i Leydner-Musæet. angaves Arten at mangle Palatin- 

 tænder, hvilket sandsynHgvis har havt sin Grund deri. at 

 det undersøgte Individ var ungt. og endnu ikke havde 

 faaet disse udviklede. UdførMgere Beskrivelse er dog 

 forst i L862 meddelt af Kroyer i Naturhistorisk Tidsskrift 

 (3die Rekke. Iste Bind 1861 — 63), og til denne Beskrivelse 

 fø jer Malmgren i sin Afhandling om Spitsbergens Fiske 



It cannot indeed be denied that, as a rule, the arran- 

 gement of the teeth on the dental hones of the cranium 

 does furnish characters of very great importance in distin- 

 guishing between allied genera of fishes; but. in the case of 

 the I/umpenus group, less weight must decidedly he attached 

 to the dental characters, which, on 'the whole, prove any- 

 thing but constant: nor does the structure of the body in 

 other respects exhibit any corresponding distinction, being 

 remarkably uniform in all the species. 



Besides, the teeth that can occur on the vomer and 

 the palatine hones are without exception exceedingly small, 

 so minute, indeed, that considerable difficulty is often 

 experienced in detecting them, even in large-sized adults. 

 Moreover, it is obvious that the teeth on these bones cannot 

 he essential, or of much importance even, to the individual, 

 seeing that they do not appear till long after those on the 

 maxillaries (never «anting) are fully developed; and hence 

 such distinctive dental characters do not apply to young 

 individuals. In L. medius', the palatine teeth are therefore 

 scarcely perceptihle in half-grown individuals (with a 

 total length under 70"""); in L. maculatus, precisely the 

 same is the case with the vomerine and palatine teeth. 

 Hence it is hardly advisable to attach much weight to 

 characters based on such dental divergences, otherwise than 

 as a means of distinguishment between sub-genera. 



Accordingly L. medius belongs, in a limited sense, 

 to the genus Lumpenus; also L. fabricii, occurring on the 

 shores of Spitsbergen and Greenland, and Pallas's Blennius 

 wnguiUaris, inhabiting the Pacific Ocean. These species 

 exhibit inter se a uniformity so general and striking, that 

 classification under separate genera, as suggested by Gill 

 and Ayres. seems quite out of the question. For L. 

 ninliiis. Gill, in 1864. established the genus Anisarchus, 

 as mentioned above; but the sole character of any real 

 value as a generic distinction, viz. the number of branchi- 

 ostegous rays — 7 in Lumpenus, 6 in Anisarchus — is 

 not strictly constant. True. Kroyer has found 7 branche- 

 ostegals in all his specimens of Z. fabricii; hut Fabricius (in 

 his description of Blennius lumpenus) gives 6. and Malm- 

 gren observed the same number in at least 3 of the 4 

 specimens he obtained ou the coast of Spitzbergen. Thus, 

 to. some extent the number of hranchiostegous rays does 

 vary in this species, and cannot therefore be appropriately 

 regarded as the sole generic character. 



The first brief diagnosis of L. medius was furnished 

 by Reinhardt. 1838. in his treatise — cited above - - on 

 the Fauna of Greenland. Giinther's diagnosis in Cat. Fish. 

 Brit. Mus. vol. 3 f 1861). from a Greenland specimen, pre- 

 served in the Museum at Leyden, describes the species as 

 not having palatine teeth; probably, however, the specimen 

 examined was a young individual, and the teeth on the 

 palatine bones accordingly as yet obsolete. The first de- 

 tailed description was given in 1862, by Kroyer (Naturh. 

 Tidsskr. 3 Række, 1 B. 1861 — 63): and this description 

 has been since supplemented by Malmgren in his treatise 



