New York, January 24, 1917. No. 39 



Published to advance the Science of cold-blooded vertebrates 



A BALISTES VETULA TOPOTYPE FROM 

 ASCENSION. 



Through the kindness of Major H. N. Benett, 

 R. M. I., Commandant of H. M. Island Ascension 

 in the tropical Atlantic, we have had the pleasure of 

 examining a topotypical example of the trigger fish, 

 Batistes vetula Linnaeus. Reference to this fish was 

 made by the writers in 1914, in connection with the 

 description of a new race of the species from Trini- 

 dad Islet in latitude 20 south (Bull. Amer. Mus. Nat. 

 Hist., Vol. XXXIII, pp. 265-26(3). At that time 

 we knew of no specimen in America of Batistes vetula 

 from the type locality, and in describing the sub- 

 species trinitatis, which obviously differed from the 

 West Indian form, we stated that the former might 

 possibly prove to be identical with Linnaeus's B. ve- 

 tula of Ascension, in which case a new name should 

 be sought for the well-known representative of West 

 Indian waters. Major Benett generously agreed to 

 assist in settling the problem, and in due course an 

 adult specimen preserved in formalin has reached us, 

 and has been catalogued as number 553 in the col- 

 lection of the Brooklyn Museum. 



We have compared the Ascension Island fish 

 with the tvpe of trinitatis which it almost exactly 

 equals in size (being 380 mm. long to base of caudal) 

 as follows: Head, 3.0 in length to base of caudal; 

 depth, 2.0; thickness of body, 2.0 in head. Head 

 bluntly pointed, dorsal and ventral outlines similarly 



