262 Annals of the Carnegie Museum. 



Batan. — Ned. Tijdschr. Dierk., I, 1863, p. 154; Haemahera. — /. c. I, 1863, 

 p. 27s; Timor. — /. c. IV, 1873, p. 133; China. — Lutken, Vid. Medd. Nath. 

 Foren, Kj0b., 1865, p. 213. — Klunziger, Verb. z. b. Ges. Wien. 1871. p. 517. — 

 Day, Fish. India, 1878, p. 361 ; Seas of India to China. — Gunther, Rept. 

 Shore Fish., 1880, p. 53; Philippines. 



Head 3. in the total length; depth 7.63; width of head 9.80 in its 

 length; interorbital space 11. in head; eye 11.; 1.60 in postorbital 

 part; D. Ill, 10; A, 12; P. 10; V. 3. 



Body very much compressed, rather elongate, thin and more or less 

 rounded above ; tapering below to an extremely thin drawn-out cutting 

 edge ; head tapering anteriorly into a long tubular snout, ending in a 

 terminal mouth; dermal skeleton ends posteriorly in a long, sharply 

 pointed spine ; interorbital space rather flat, with a shallow median 

 groove, both sides of which longitudinally striated ; the rostral tube 

 compressed into a cutting edge inferiorly; mouth extremely small, 

 terminal, with no teeth; nostrils lateral, very close together, situated 

 one before the other in front of the orbit ; operculum ovate, longer 

 than high, antero-inferior edge sharply pointed downward; sub- 

 operculum broad anteriorly, tapering behind; pnne- and inter-operculum 

 united, thin and transparent, forming a broad membraneous margin 

 below the throat ; eye moderate, situated at the posterior one-fourth 

 of the head. 



The back of the trunk cuirassed by a bony sheath, which extends 

 downward nearly to the middle of the sides, having a shallow notch 

 before and above the pectoral ; the cuirass produced posteriorly into 

 a sharply pointed spine ; it consists of four median pairs of narrow 

 bones and six lateral ones of lamelliform shape, and of a single, long 

 dagger-shaped bone which forms the dorsal spine, the sutures of all 

 these bones deeply serrated except the dorsal median suture ; lower 

 half of the sides covered by a transparent tough covering, supported 

 by ten ribs. 



Close beneath the posterior spine the vertical fins are crowded; 

 the spinous and soft dorsals point nearly straight backward, the caudal 

 obliquely downward, and the anal straight downward ; the pectoral 

 inserted upon the middle of the sides above, the distance from the 

 operculum equal to the length from the pre-orbital edge to the end 

 of operculum, the distance between origin of pectoral and the tip of 

 snouts equals the distance between the former and the root of the 



