EEPRODUCTION AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE CONGER. 37 



The next account from an actual observer which I have seen is 

 that of Colonel Montagu in the Memoirs of the Wernerian Natural 

 History Society vol. ii, 1818, This naturalist says he possessed 

 two specimens taken by Mr. Anstice, of Bridgewater, in the river 

 Pervet, one in 1810, the other in 1811. Both were caught in a 

 hand-net near the surface of the water. Montagu says that 

 Pennant^s description is wrong in stating that pectoral and caudal 

 fins were absent. He says his largest specimen was 6 inches long, 

 ^ inch broad, -yq^^ inch thick ; jaws equal in length, teeth nume- 

 rous and all inclining forwards. Dorsal fin does not extend the whole 

 length of the back as Pennant stated, but commences one third the 

 length of the body from the snout. Pectorals very minute. Pen- 

 nant's description also omits mention of the minute black specks on 

 the margin of the back and belly. 



In Gmelin^s edition of Linnjeus's Systema Naturse, 1788, the fish 

 as described by Gronovius had been introduced under the binomial 

 name Leptocephahis Morrisii, and this name is used by Montagu. 

 In all probability Montagu is right in believing that Pennant^s fish 

 and his own were the same, and that Pennant's description and 

 figure were erroneous. Montagu's description and figure have 

 been shown by subsequent observers to be correct, and it is there- 

 fore rather from him than from Pennant tbat we should date our 

 knowledge of the form which he calls Leptocephahis Morrisii. 



In Loudon's Magazine of Natural History, vol. v, 1832, p. 313, 

 there is a description from actual observation by R. Couch, the 

 Cornish ichthyologist, of a fish which he calls Ophidium pellucidum, 

 but which he says, in a second communication in the same volume, 

 is undoubtedly the same as the Leptocephalus Morrisii of Fleming's 

 British Animals. Fleming's account is simply taken from that of 

 Montagu. Couch says he had seen four specimens and gives the 

 length (presumably of the largest) as 5^ inches, depth -^ inch. 

 There are only one or two points in which this description by Couch 

 does not agree with that of Montagu. One is that the former does 

 not mention the lateral compression of the fish, although he refers 

 to its great transparency. Another is the statement that one 

 specimen differed from the others in having two bifid teeth pro- 

 jecting forward from the under jaw ; in proportion to the size of 

 the fish they might be termed tusks. If we compare this statement 

 with Raffaele's description of the teeth in the larvse hatched from 

 his unidentified pelagic eggs, we are at once led to conclude that 

 tbe teeth observed by Couch were the remains of the more prominent 

 and more numerous teeth of a still earlier stage of the conger larva, 

 and Couch's observation confirms the hypothesis that Raffaele's eggs 

 are those of the Muraenidse. 



