NO.1303. JAPANESE OPHIDIOID FISBE^JORDAN AND FOWLER. 761 



snout, •1| ; maxillary, 2; interorbital space, 4; width of mouth at maxil- 

 laries, 1^; pectoral. If; ventrals, 1 f. 



Body elongate, greath^ compressed, its greatest width much less 

 than the breadth of the head, and tapering into a pointed tail. Head 

 oblong, compressed; snout very blunt, truncate; jaws equal; eye small, 

 elongate, lateral and its posterior margin about the first f of the length 

 of the head; maxillary very large, extending far beyond eye, its distal 

 expanded moiety equal to snout, and the posterior edge slightly 

 emarginate; supplemental maxillary well developed and not entirely 

 slipping under the infraorbitals, which are not as broad as the eye 

 diameter; teeth in rather broad, rough, villiform bands on vomer and 

 palatines and in the jaws; lips fleshy and more or less papillose or 

 shredded; tongue very broad, thick, pointed, and hardly free in front; 

 nostrils in front of eye; upper profile straight from snout to occiput; 

 preoperculum with 3 strong spines protruding through the skin, the 

 lower one pointing downward and the other 2 pointing downward 

 and backward; opercle with a strong spine above, bent down and 

 backward; a number of mucous pores on head, several on opercles 

 above, on the mandible, orbitals, and 2 large ones at the edge of 

 the snout in front of nostrils; interorbital space convex, its width 

 equal to snout. Gill-opening ver}" large, the isthmus long and nar- 

 row, and the membrane thick, united directly below front of eye; a 

 toothed area extending from near tip of tongue to posterior part of 

 pharynx, the roof of which is furnished with a toothed surface similar 

 to those of the jaws; pseudobranchia? very small; gill-rakers 5 -f 16, 

 thick, short, those of the upper limb and all but 5 of the lower 

 reduced to mere rounded elevations, the other short and flat; l)ranchi- 

 ostegals, 8. 



Head naked, except opercles, the sides of head above, and preoper- 

 cles, which are covered with rather large cycloid scales; scales on l)ody 

 similar, becoming elongated at the end of the tail. 



Dorsal, anal, and caudal confluent, the latter ending in a point; the 

 membrane at l)ase of the fins rather fleshy; dorsal beginning above over 

 the first third of pectoral, or at a distance behind head equal to one-fourth 

 the latter's length; pectoral long, pointed, and reaching vent; ventrals 

 divided to within a short distance of their base, the remaining basal 

 space not divided equal to an eye in diameter; the inner ventral ra}^ 

 the longest and not quite to the ])ase of pectoral; the ventrals are 

 inserted below the anterior portion of the eye. Lateral line superior, 

 approaching nearer to the l)ack posteriori}^, and becoming olisolete at 

 a distance from the tip of the caudal equal to three-fourths the length 

 of the head. 



Color in alcohol uniform pale brown overlaid with silver}^ the dorsal 

 and anal becoming deep brown posteriori}^ like the caudal, which is 

 entirely the same color. 



