DR. RICHARDSON'S DESCRIPTION OF AUSTRALIAN FISH. 125 



the soft margin of the mouth. A similar ascending process of the lower jaw nearly 

 touches the plate ; and the tip of the straight cyhndrical maxillary, which never reaches 

 the margin of the mouth, is connected to both by thick short folds of integument, allow- 

 ing free motion, but preventing the three bones from separating to any distance from each 

 other. The maxillary glides entirely beneath the infra-orbitar. The limbs of the lower 

 jaw are of even width, lie parallel to each other and their own breadth apart, the space 

 between being occupied by a fillet of smooth integument, which shows also interiorly, 

 before the tongue, where there is a mesial furrow instead of a keel, as in some other 

 Mullets. The limbs of the jaw are each pierced by four pores, and are scaly ; they 

 separate into a different plane from the intervening cushion when they are depressed. 

 The dental surface of the jaw is thin, the integuments forming a distinct lip or fold at 

 the angle only of the mouth, considerably behind which the thin vertical plate of the 

 jaw hes in the membranous parietes, producing by its action on the tip of the labial the 

 protrusion of the intermaxillaries. 



A fine stripe of minute villiform teeth borders both jaws, and immediately behind 

 them, above and below, there is a narrow velum. The slender transverse ridge on the 

 fore-part of the vomer is covered with rather shorter teeth, and on each palate bone 

 there is a tapering stripe, which runs backwards at a right angle with the vomerine one. 

 Some distance behind these there is a square villiform patch on the mesial line, and a 

 lateral one on each side, broader than the anterior ones. The roof of the mouth is 

 arched, and is destitute of any indentation in the fore-part of the vomer, or of a mesial 

 furrow farther back. The tongue has a flat surface, without a vestige of a central keel ; 

 but it is bordered by a row of rough plates, and it has two very minute stripes on its tip. 

 Neither is there any keel shown by the soft parts within the jaw, anterior to the tongue ; 

 and there are no papillae on the parietes of the mouth. 



The eye comes near to the profile of the forehead, but does not touch it, and its dia- 

 meter is equal to one-fifth of the length of the head : it is twice as far from the gill- 

 opening as from the end of the snout. The eyelids have no remarkable extension. The 

 two orifices of the nostrils are approximated, and are placed before the eye. The sub- 

 orbitar is shaped much like that of Mugil capita ; it has no notch anteriorly, and is 

 toothed on its rounded tip and on the lower part of its anterior margin. It is not ridged, 

 neither is its surface perfectly even. 



The scales are rectangular, with three straight sides, the exposed edge alone forming 

 the segment of a circle : this edge is finely but irregularly toothed, and the adjoining 

 surface is also roughened by minute teeth : on the base there are from eight to ten well- 

 marked, slightly diverging lurrows, which scarcely produce marginal crenatures. There 

 are fifty scales in a longitudinal line, exclusive of some small ones on the base of the 

 caudal. The head is scaly above, down to the nostrils, and also beneath, with the excep- 

 tion of the suborbitar, the isthmus connecting the limbs of the lower jaw and the very 

 narrow gill-membrane. Between the ventrals there is an acutely conical scaly plate. 



