2332 Bulletin 47, United States National Museum. 



2604. GOBIESOX CEPHALUS, LacepMe. 



(TiiTAED; Testae.) 



D. 9 or 10; A. 6; C. 12; P. 19 or 20. Head aud anterior part of body- 

 very broad, much depressed; skin tough, naked, and smooth ; head nearly 

 as broad as U)ng, with its profile seniielliptical, the snout being very 

 obtuse and rounded. The upper surface of the head is quite Hat, gently 

 sloping downward in a straight line from the nape to the snout. The 

 o-reatest width of the iuterorbital space is I of that of the head, or 4 times 

 the diameter of the eye. The cleft of the mouth is horizontal, curved, 

 wide, extending to below the center of the eye; the lips are thick, the 

 lower being divided into 5 portions by 4 vertical grooves, the central por- 

 tion being the smallest, the lateral ones the largest and hanging down- 

 ward. The upper jaw is slightly protractile, and there is a broad velum 

 behind the teeth in each jaw. A band of short conical teeth in the uiiper 

 jaw; a single series in the lower, the anterior ones being slightly com- 

 pressed incisors, and small like the lateral teeth, which are conical. The 

 eye is small, situated immediately below the upper profile of the head. 

 Two nostrils, close together, opposite the upper angle of the orbit, their 

 margins being slightly raised. The lower angle of the opercular apparatus 

 terminates posteriorly in an obtuse movable point enveloped in skin and 

 directed backward. The gill openings are somewhat narrow in conse- 

 qvience of the small degree of expansibility of the gill covers, but the 

 gill membranes have the margin quite free, being united together under 

 the throat, and not attached to the isthmus. There are only 3 gills ; the 

 pseudobranchia^ are quite rudimentary, indicated by 2 or 3 short lamella^. 

 The distance of the origin of the dorsal fin from the caudal is nearly ^ of 

 its distance from the snout, its first ray is much shorter than the others, 

 and apparently without articulations. The caudal rounded and of mod- 

 erate length; the anal is only \ as long as the dorsal, commencing Itelow 

 its ndddle and terminating in the same vertical. The pectoral is broad 

 and short, its lower i being longer than the upper; it is slightly connected 

 with the ventral. A vertical fold of the skin at the l)a8e of the ])ectoral; 

 the coracoid is so high as to reach to the upper margin of the pectoral. The 

 adhesive apparatus as broad as long, its length being contained 3A times 

 in the total. The vent and the porus urogenitalis are close together, sit- 

 uated midway between the maigin of the ventral disk and the anal. The 

 anal papilla is small. The color is brown (in spirits), whitish interiorly. 

 Length of adult, 7 inches. (Giinther.) Caribbean Sea, said to be com- 

 mon ; not seen liy us. The original G. cephalus seems nearer the next 

 species, if the 2 are really different. If that be the case the present species 

 may stand as Gobiesox stanvii. But we have no material ade(j[uate to settle 

 this ([uestion. (oep/taZMS, big-headed; Kc^aA?/, head.) 



Oobiesox cephalus, Lacepede, Hist. Nat. Poiss., n, 595, 1798, Martinique ; on a drawing by 

 PlumieR; D. 8; A. 4 or 5; color plain reddish ; auallnserted behind dorsal ; head broad ; 

 eyes blue; GiJNTHER, Cat., m, 499, 1861. 



Lepadogaster teslar. Block & ScHNEmER, Syst. Ichth., 445, 1801, Martinique; after 

 Plumier. 



Ootylis atminii, MOller &- Troschel, Hor. Ichthyol., ui, 18, taf. 3, tig. 3, 1845. 



