64 MEMOIES OF THE QUEENSLAND MUSEUM. 



reaching to above the 5th or 6th anal ray. Ventral small and rounded, 2-66 to 

 3-2 in the length of the pectoral and 9-2 to 10-1 in that of the body; 2nd ray 

 longest, reaching the vent. 



Gill-rakers long and slender, 8 to 6 -f- 28 to 30 on the anterior arch, the 

 longest 1-2 in the gill-fringes and 5-5 in the length of the head. Yent one half 

 nearer to the origin of the ventrals than to the anal. 



Blue above, shading into bronze on the upper side, the lower side and 

 breast silvery. Upper surface of head, snout, and tip of mandible bronze; a 

 large blackish shoulder-spot, encroaching well on the upper edge of the opercle ; 

 sides and lower surface of head, a blotch on the throat, and the bases of the 

 pectoral, ventral, and anal fins washed with dull gold. Fins hyaline, except the 

 anterior dorsal spines and the outer ray and tip of the upper caudal lobe, which 

 are blackish, (kalla; the Tamil name for this species.) 8 



Described from three specimens, measuring respectively 152, 160, and 

 176 millim., trawled off the Coast of Middle Queensland during the winter of 

 1910. The largest and smallest are in the Queensland Museum, the other in that 

 of our Amateur Fishermen's Association, by whom it was kindly lent at our 

 request. We have also examined the type of Micropteryx queenslandim de Vis, 

 which is certainly this species. 



Vernacular name: — There being no trivial name, local or otherwise, for 

 this trevally, we have been obliged to coin the above, which was suggested by its 

 extraordinary resemblance in general form to some' of our species of Sardinella. 



Historical : — The earliest notice of this singular carangid will be found 

 in the " Histoire Naturelle des Poissons," in which Valenciennes describes it 

 from Pondicherry, a French settlement on the Coromandel Coast of India, 

 where it was known by the Tamil name of ' ' kalla pare, " or " kalla parah ' ' as 

 Day prefers to write it. Valenciennes also declares that he had seen specimens 

 sent from Mahe on the Malabar Coast by Belenger and Dussumier, as well as 

 others in the Geoffroyan collection from the Red Sea ; it is, however, strange, if the 

 latter locality be correct, that it should have so entirely escaped the notice of such 

 keen observers as Ruppell, Klunzinger, Kossmann, and other historians of that 

 well explored area. He also mentions incidentally that Bloch's collection con- 

 tained an example without locality, which was labelled Scomber bimaculatus, 

 but of which no description seems to have been published. In 1851 Bleeker 

 described as new from Batavia a closely allied species, to which he gave the 

 name Selar brevis, and which is said to differ from S. kalla principally in having 

 the dorsal and ventral contours symmetrical and the curve of the lateral line 

 shorter, terminating below instead of well behind the origin of the soft dorsal. 

 Giinther in 1860 accepted this species as valid, but Day, sixteen years later, 

 challenged its validity, referring it as a synonym to S. kalla. Apparently, how- 

 ever, Jordan, Richardson, and Seale, having examined specimens of both forms 

 from the Philippines, have convinced themselves of their specific value, and we, 



"McCulloch (in lit.) remarks — "a few specimens retain traces of about six vertical bars 

 from the back downwards. 



