HETEROrLEURON HECTORI, NEW ZEALAND LANCKLET. 273 



Heteropleuron hectori, the New Zealand 

 Lancelet. 



By 



W. Blaxland Boiiliaiii, D.Sc, i^I.A., F.Z.S., 

 Trofessor of Biology in the Universitj of Otago. 



With Plate 17. 



By the kiuduess of Sir James Hectoi* I have been able to 

 examine a couple of specimens of an " Amphioxus " that have 

 been for some years past in the Colonial Museum at 

 Wellington, N.Z. The specimens are referred to by Captain 

 Hutton in his ' Catalogue of the Fishes of New Zealand/ 

 published by the Colonial Museum and Geological Survey 

 Department in 1872. 



On p. 88 of this catalogue, under the title of " Bran- 

 chiostoma lanceolatum," a brief series of measurements are 

 given^ but without any details to enable one to judge that 

 they are different from the type of the family. At that 

 period, and for some years later, indeed, even Dr. Giinther 

 believed that the various specimens from extra-European 

 seas belonged to this same species, as is evident from the 

 account of the lancelet in his 'Study of Fishes' (1880). 

 Since Hutton's reference to them they seem to have been 

 entirely overlooked by recent writers, for no mention is made 

 of any New Zealand representative of the family either by 

 Andrews, by Willey, or by Kirkaldy, in their respective 

 accounts of this animal. 



This New Zealand Lancelet is the type of a new species of 



VOL. 44, PART 2. NEW SERIES. S 



