126 EDIBLE EISHES OP NEW SOUTH WALES. 



other reasons, are considered worthy of a distinctive vernacular nomenclature, 

 it is almost hopeless to expect to educate the general public, who go entirely 

 by these trivial and frequently senseless names, into a due appreciation of 

 the diiferences which constitute a species ; in our opinion the various 

 forms should be as carefully described in the vernacular as in the scientific 

 designation. This species, for instance, which is appropriately the " Sea Mullet" 

 of the mother Colony and Queensland is the miscalled '' Sand Mullet " of 

 Victoria and Tasmania, and while the " Sea Mullet " of the latter Colony 

 is the comparatively worthless Agonostomaforsteri^i\\e " Sand Mullet " of 

 New South Wales is the Myxics elongatus of G-unther, more commonly 

 known as " Tallegalane," while to complicate matters, in all ways bad enough, 

 nothing will persuade most i^ersons that the immature stages of the present 

 species do not specifically differ from the adult, and both in this Colony and 

 in Queensland grant to them that rank by the respective titles of " Hard- 

 gut " and " Mangrove Mullet." 



These fishes attain to a length of at least twenty four inches. 



It is not an uncommon occurrence to find examples of the Sea Mullet, 

 which through some accident in early youth have had the snout cut oft' in 

 front of the eyes ; a remarkable specimen was sent to the Australian 

 Museum a short time ago, in which the entire front of the head was so far 

 cut away as to have destroyed all vestiges of the mouth and nostrils proper, 

 and to have left a mere small longittidinal slit on the right side of the ventral 

 axis of the snoitt, which slit had developed around it a series of moderately 

 strong acute teeth ; this tends to the belief that originally the Mxigilidce 

 possessed teeth, which, owing to their peculiar method of feeding, have fallen 

 into desuetude, but are still lying dormant, ready to appear and become 

 functional on such a,n emergency as at present cited In this case, as in all 

 others observed, the sufferer was found to be in excellent condition. 



The immature fish, before it has visited the open sea, is not unfrequently 

 infested by a species of Aniloco'a, which usually attaches itself to the inner 

 side of the axil of the pectoral fin. 



MUGIL PEEONI. 



Mugil peroni, Cuv & Yal. Hist. Nat. Poiss. xi. p. 138; Gnth. Catal. Fish. iii. 

 p. 452 ; Casteln. Proc. Zool. Soc. Vict. ii. p. 151, and Proc. Linn. Soc. 

 N. S. Wales, iii. p. 387 ; Macleay, Proc. Linn. Soc. N. S. Wales iv. 

 p. 421. 



Flat-tailed Mullet. 



Plate XXXII. 



B. vi. D. 4. 1/8 A. 3/10. V. 1/5. P. 16. C. 14. L. lat. 35-38. L. tr. 14. Coec. 



pyl. 2. Vert. 11/13. 



Length of head 4-33-4-85, of caudal fin 4-25-4"50, height of body 

 4"50-4'80 in the total length. Eye with the adipose lid but little developed, 

 its diameter 4"25-4'75 in the length of the head, 1'20-1"45 in that of the 

 snout, which is obtusely rounded, moderately broad, and very slightly con- 

 vex, and 1 '60-2 "00 in the interorbital space, which is convex. Lips thin: 

 jaws fringed with minute cilia. Nostrils approximate, upright, suboval, the 

 anterior slightly nearer to the orbit than to the tip of the snout ; the 

 posterior about twice as large as the anterior. Free space below the chin 

 lanceolate, equal to or rather longer than the distance between the end of 

 the snout and the posterior margin of the orbit. The maxilla extends to 



