DR. RICHARDSON'S DESCRIPTION OF AUSTRALIAN FISH. 99 



Apistes marmoratus, Cuv. et Val. iv. p. 416. 



Our specimens correspond exactly with the description of the species in the work 

 referred to, except that the first suborbitar has only one tooth anteriorly, which is well- 

 marked and acute. This bone is short, thin and triangular, giving out backwards the 

 characteristic tapering spine, which in one specimen nearly reaches the preoperculum, 

 but in another is one-third shorter, being only just the length of the preopercular spine, 

 while in a third it is of intermediate length. 



Mr. Lempriere informs me that this fish haunts shallow waters near sandy beaches, 

 and is very poisonous, several persons having suffered from eating it. The natives 

 dread it. Its Port Arthur appellation is ' Toad-fish.' 



The skin is very smooth to the touch, and is loosely connected through the me- 

 dium of tough fibres to the shining nacry fascia which invests the muscles. The sto- 

 mach was filled with tender Crustacea ; its fundus is a very blunt ' cul de sac,' and 

 the pylorus opens at two-thirds of the whole length of the viscus from the gullet. 

 Nine cteca of unequal sizes surround the gut a short way beneath the pylorus : only 

 six caeca are mentioned in the ' Histoire des Poissons.' The skeleton is exactly as de- 

 scribed in that work, the number of the vertebrae being twenty-eight, of which eleven 

 are abdominal. The teeth are also as therein mentioned, those on the pharyngeal 

 bones and branchial knobs being like those of the palatine bones, vomer and jaws, very 

 short and densely villiform. 



Cheilodactylus carponemus, Cuv. et Val. v. p. 362. 



Radii.— B. 6 ; D. 17|31 ; A. 3|19 ; P. 9 ei VI., V. 1|5. 



Our example of this fish is a foot long, but it is said by Mr. Lempriere to reach the 

 length of eighteen inches when full-grown, to be known locally by the name of the 

 ' Perch,' and to have a bright silvery hue with dark spots. The specimen retains a 

 dark tint on the top of the head, on the snout, and in the inside of the mouth ; and 

 there are vestiges of spots on the sides and fins, particularly the caudal one. A drawing 

 of Dr. Lhotsky's, made at Port Arthur, represents the fish as silvery, with a brownish 

 or purplish red hue on the back, but without spots, except a dark blotch on the tip of 

 the gill-flap, another at the beginning of the lateral line, and a deep blue mark on the 

 membranes of the jaws. In the ' Histoire des Poissons' the species is said to be some- 

 times spotted with brown on the back, and to have the fins yellowish. In some parti- 

 culars our specimen differs from the figure (Plate CXXVIII.) in that work, such as the 

 spinous portion of the dorsal being more arched, and the spines much thicker. The 

 second spine is only half the length of the sixth, and the seventeenth is still lower, but 

 the figure represents them as only one-sixth shorter than the longest spine. The soft rays 

 are shorter, and decrease in height gradually towards the end of the fin. The whole 

 fin falls back into a groove which is formed at the base of the soft portion by a distinct 

 fillet on each side, clothed with three rows of small scales, not indicated in the 



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