XXII APODES 603 
its capture. els are extremely voracious, and endowed with an 
extraordinary tenacity of life; they can live for many hours out 
of the water, and are often met with at night creeping through 
the grass of meadows from one pond or stream to another. 
One of the most remarkable among the deep-sea Eels is the 
Snub-nosed Hel (Simenchelys parasiticus), which has been found 
in great numbers off Newfoundland and the Azores, at depths of 
200 to 900 fathoms. The maxillary and mandibular bones are 
very short and massive, provided with large obtuse teeth; the 
head is short and bulldog-hke in aspect, the mouth small and 
bordered by a thick circular lip. Some specimens have been 
observed to burrow in the muscles of living Halibut and other 
large Fishes, after the manner of MJyaine. 
Fam. 2. Nemichthyidae.— Distinguished from the preceding 
by the position of the vent, which is close to, or at no great 
distance from, the gill-openings. The rays of the vertical fins 
are connected by thin membrane instead of being imbedded in 
thick skin, as in most Eels; in some of the genera the jaws are 
excessively prolonged, needle-like, sometimes recurved. Deep-sea 
Eels of small size, represented in the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian 
Oceans by about 10 species, referred to 6 genera: Dysomma, 
Dysommatopsis, Nemichthys, Spinivomer, Serrivomer, Gavialiceps. 
Fam. 3. Synaphobranchidae.— Maxillaries narrowly separated 
on the median line, their extremity strongly attached by hgament 
to the mandible; pterygo-palatine arch absent. Giull-openings 
externally confluent into a single ventral slit. Deep-sea Fishes, 
resembling the true Eels in the general form and in the pres- 
ence of linear scales placed at right angles, but differing in the 
absence of the pterygo-palatine arch, as in the Saccopharyngidae. 
Eight species of Synaphobranchus are known, from the Atlantic, 
Pacific, and Indian Oceans, at depths of 200 to 2000 fathoms. 
Fam. 4. Saccopharyngidae.—Maxillaries narrowly separated 
on the median line, extremely elongate; mouth enormous ; 
pterygo-palatine arch absent; hyomandibular arch slender and 
movably articulated to the cranium, the two bones (hyomandi- 
bular and quadrate) of which it is composed being capable of 
being swung in all directions; branchial arches far behind the 
skull; uo branchiostegal rays or pharyngeal bones. 
Extraordinary-looking deep-sea Fishes allied to the Eels, of 
which they appear to be a further degraded type, the muscles 
