386 Mr. A. Alcock on the Bathyhial Fishes 



Pycnocraspedum, gen. nov. 



Allied to Barathrodemus. 



Head large, body compressed, both covered entirely with 

 small, thin, smooth, rather deciduous scales. Head-bones 

 and opercles spineless. Snout short, broad, and not over- 

 hanging the jaws, which are equal in front. Eye of mode- 

 rate size. Mouth very large ; teeth in villiform bands in the 

 jaws, palatines, and vomer. No barbel. Gill-openings wide, 

 gill-membranes entirely separate; four gills; eight branchio- 

 stegals ; no pseudobranchiffi. Lateral line incomplete on the 

 tail. Vertical fins invested with thick scaly skin. Caudal 

 free, united with the verticals at its extreme base only. Pec- 

 toral fins entire. Ventral fins in the form of bifid filaments. 



Pycnocraspedum squamipinnej sp. nov. 



Head large, flattened a little laterally and very much at its 

 crown ; body broad immediately behind the head, where its 

 height is 5\ in the total length ; its posterior portion and the 

 tapering tail compressed. Head in length 3| in the total (with 

 caudal) ; its height 1| in its length ; its width a little over fits 

 height ; all its bones strong and smooth. Snout broad, rounded, 

 rather depressed, flattened at the tip, and not overhanging 

 the jaws ; its length is hardly more than that of the eye, 

 which is one sixth of that of the head. Interorbital space 

 flat and wider than the long diameter of the eye. Operculum 

 with a bony ridge above, ending in a blunt point. Preoper- 

 culum slightly emarginate at its angle. A large open nostril 

 in front of the eye and a smaller valved one near the edge of 

 the snout. Cleft of mouth obliquely ascending, its gape 

 enormous. The maxilla, which extends behind the vertical 

 from the posterior border of the orbit, is much expanded pos- 

 teriorly, and there covered with scales. The premaxillaries 

 are protractile and not closely approximated. All the jaw- 

 bones very strong. Teeth in villiform bands in the jaws and 

 palatines and in a V-shaped patch on the vomer. 



Gill-openings very wide ; gill-laminjB rather broad ; four 

 long gill-rakers on the outer edge of the middle of the first 

 arch, elsewhere in the form of short knobbed styles. Body 

 and head covered with small, thin, smooth, rather deciduous 

 scales, fifty-two in a transverse line through the anus. The 

 lateral line ends in the posterior tourth of the tail. Vertical 

 fins with stout rays invested with thick integument and 

 covered with scales smaller than those on the body ; tlic dorsal 

 begins just in front of the base of the pectorals. Caudal ex- 



