VI COLORATION 165 
In an Austrahan Fish (Plectropoma richardsoni) the pre- 
valent ground colour of the body is a brilliant carmine, with a 
tendency to yellow beneath, and diversified on the back and sides 
with ultramarine spots of almost sapphire-like intensity.! Certain 
Australian species of Beryx (B. affinis and B. miilleri)? have a 
similar ground-colour when freshly caught, but with various 
opalescent tints, chiefly blue and lilac reflections. In Polynemus 
vereker® the ground colour is chrome yellow, with darker markings, 
the pectoral and caudal fins are bright orange, the remaining fins 
being a lighter shade of the same tint, and by contrast the long 
free filaments of the pectoral fins are a bright vermilion red. The 
Velvet-Fish (Holoxenus cutaneus), also a denizen of Australian 
seas, has a dominant colour of brilliant scarlet vermilion, or a 
mixture of vermilion and orange. The skin has no scales and 
presents a singular pilose or velvety appearance.* It is, however, 
in some of the Pacific Trigger-Fishes (e.g. Monacanthus) and 
Coffer-Fishes (species of Ostracion) that the eccentricities of 
coloration are perhaps most strikingly manifest, for not only are 
the prevailing colours of the most brilliant description, but the 
presence of differently coloured bands or stripes, often arranged 
in complex patterns, adds greatly to the gorgeous and singularly 
bizarre appearance of these Fishes. To quote one illustration, 
the male of the Tasmanian Coffer-Fish (Ostracion ornatus) ® has 
the back and sides of its body grass-green and its belly pale 
lemon: the caudal fin is orange-yellow, and the remaining fins a 
neutral transparent tint. The sides of the trunk and head are 
traversed by broad, irregular, and somewhat interrupted bands 
of the most brilliant ultramarine blue, the edges of which are 
sharply defined by dark chocolate-brown hnes. Two or three of 
the blue body-bands are continued on to the caudal fin, where 
they curl into characteristic loop-like patterns. The lemon- 
yellow of the belly is further variegated by a reticulated pattern 
in pale blue. In the female, formerly regarded as a distinct 
species, the ground colour is not green but a pale pinkish-grey, 
or dove-colour, with local flushes of a more decided pink, and the 
belly is a pure yellow. The blue stripes of the male are repre- 
sented in the female by comparatively unbroken bands of a rich 
reddish-brown which, at the bases of the pectoral and dorsal fins, 
1 Saville Kent, The Naturalist in Australia, London, 1897, p. 150. 
2 Ibid. p. 167 3 Ibid. p. 168. a Tbids Ds LS. 5 Ibid. p. 188. 
