274 CYCLOI'TEllID.E. 



SUBBRACHIAL 



MALACOPTERYGII. CYCLOPTERIDJ-:. 



THE UNCTUOUS SUCKER, 



OK, SEA-SNAIL. 



lAparis vulgaris, Sea Snail, Flem. Brit. An. p. 190, sp. 73. 

 ,, ,, CuviER, Regne An. t. ii. p. 346. 



,, nostras, Sea Snail, Willughby, App. p. 17, H. 6, fig. 1. 

 Cyclopterus liparis, Linnsus. 13loch, pt. iv. pi. 123, fig. 3. 



,, ,, Unctuous Sucker, Penn. Brit. Zool. vol. iii. p. 179, pi. 24. 



,, „ „ ,, Don. Brit, Fish. pi. 47. 



Generic Characters. — Body without scales, smooth, elongated, compressed 

 posteriorly ; a single dorsal fin rather lengthened ; ventral fins united to the 

 pectorals, and surrounding a single disk. 



The Unctuous Suckek, or Sea-Snail, so called from 

 tlie soft and slimy surface of its body, appears to be miicli 

 more common in the nortliern parts of the British Islands 

 than in the sotithern. Mr. Scoresby, and other observers, 

 have even found it as far north as Greenland ; and specimens 

 of it were taken in the trawl-net on the west coast of Davis's 

 Straights during the first Arctic voyage of Captain Sir Ed- 

 ward Parry ; yet it does not appear to be mentioned by Pro- 

 fessor Nilsson or Reinhardt in their accounts of the fishes of 

 the Scandinavian shores ; nor is it included by Linnaeus in 

 his Fauna Siiccica. 



