822 CALIFORNIA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 
and slender, very slightly depressed, about three plates 
in front of caudal fin it widens slightly and is compressed; 
belly somewhat prominent, breaking the otherwise straight 
vertical outline from chin to caudal! fin; dorsal outline 
straight from occiput to caudal fin. 
Head as viewed from above almost regularly triangu- 
lar, the prominent preopercular spines and the snout form- 
ing the angles; its dorsal profile irregular, much broken 
by spines. . 
Mouth inferior, broadly U-shaped, maxillary reaching 
just past the vertical from front of orbit; lips thick, cov- 
ered with short, fine papilla; upper jaw protractile; teeth 
small, in villitorm bands, on the jaws, vomer and palatines ; 
the distance from the anterior edge of premaxillary to end 
of the rostral spines is less than half the length of snout; 
two cirri as long as pupil under rostral spines, anterior 
lower edge ot preorbitals with cirri, a group of 3 cirri on 
end of maxillary, and a group of 4 or 5 on posterior end 
of mandible; one on the middle of each branchiostegal 
ray, these forming a line from isthmus to opercle an area 
on chin from the mouth to the hyal bones ‘‘woolly’’ with 
short cirri; 2 or 3 cirri on lower edge of opercle and in- 
teropercle. A pair of parallel rostral spines pointing for- 
ward, their tips covered with skin; behind them is a deep 
oval pit, on the anterior outer edge of which are a pair of 
spines that point upward and outward and are slightly 
hooked backwards; at the posterior end of the pit are two 
spines, smaller than those above, and slightly curved 
backward; no median nor movable spine at tip of 
snout; a group of four short spines around anterior 
edge of eye, and one large triangular spine over posterior 
edge; the interorbital space is deeply concave, with a 
low sharp ridge on each side of the median line; pre- 
opercle very rough with irregular spines and tubercles; 
