108 OOBIID^. 



Skeleton. — The skull is very broad and depressed, the crown quite 

 ^at, with a short and low occipital crest posteriorly ; the interorbital 

 space is broad. The maxillary bone is curved, sabre-shaped, rather 

 dilated towards its extremity. The intermaxillary has the posterior 

 processes short, and its extremity dilated ; it does not extend so far 

 backwards as the maxillary. The mandible is strongly bent, the 

 dentary bones forming a broad anterior portion. The vomer is broad 

 and flat ; infraorbital ring complete, but feeble. The bones forming 

 the tympanic groove are more ossified than in Gobius, the tympanic 

 bone having the same form as in the species of that genus, and leaving 

 the same large free space closed only by a membrane between its two 

 portions. The praeoperculum has a double free edge, enclosing a 

 muciferous channel; interoperculum small; suboperculum rather 

 large, subcrescentic ; none of the branchiostegals dilated. The 

 base of the brain-capsule is exceedingly broad and very slightly 

 convex. 



Glossohyal broad and triangular ; urohyal more elongate. 



The bones of the humeral arch are remarkably thin and feeble. 



There are twelve abdominal and fourteen caudal vertebrae : in this 

 species the former portion of the vertebral column is longer than the 

 caudal, which is of rare occurrence in this order of fishes ; the ratio 

 is 1*16 : 1. The ribs are strong, suspended from long parapophyses ; 

 the neural, haemal, interhsemal and interneural spines are feeble. 



lines. 



Length of the first vertebra 1| 



of the fifth vertebra 2i- 



of the twelfth vertebra 2 



of the sixteenth vertebra If 



of the twenty-fifth vertebra 1^ 



of the abdominal portion 25 



of the caudal portion 21| 



2. Eleotris cantoris. 



Eleotris porocephalus, Cant. Catal. p. 195 ; Bleek. Amboina, iv. p. 344 

 (not Cut: <S- Val). 



D.6||. 



A.|. L.lat. 36-37. 



Twelve series of scales between the origin of the posterior dorsal 

 and the anal. Head entirely scaly, except the foremost part of the 

 snout ; scales on the upper surface of the head smaller than those on 

 the side of the body, there being about twenty-two or twenty-three 

 transverse series between the snout and the first dorsal fin. The 

 height of the body is contained five times and a half or six times in 

 the total length, the length of the head three times and three-quarters 

 or four times. Head obtuse, flat, depressed. The diameter of the 

 eye is one-fifth or one-sixth of the length of the head, two-thirds of 

 that of the snout, and about one-half of the width of the interorbital 

 space. The cleft of the mouth extends beyond the vertical from the 

 centre of the eye. Teeth in villiform bands. Brownish, marbled 



