A REVIEW OF THE MULLID.^:, SURMULLETS, OR GOAT- 

 FLSHES OF THE SHORES OF JAPAN. 



By John Otterbein Snyder, 



Assistant Professor of Zoologii, Stanford Unmrsitii, ('alifornia. 



T!ie following- account of the MuUicla^ of Japan is based on material 

 collected by Messrs. Jordan and Snyder during the summer of 1900. 

 Collections from the Philippines, Samoa, Formosa, and Hawaii have 

 also been available. Specimens of the species collected have been 

 deposited in the United States National Museum and in the collections 

 of Stanford University. 



One species, Pseudupeneus isckyrus^ is described as new. 



The writer wishes to express his obligations to Dr. David Starr 

 Jordan for indispensable aid in the preparation of this paper. 



Family MULLID^. 



Body elongate, slightl}" compressed; upper profile of head more or 

 less parabolic; mouth small, low, subtermiiial; eye moderate, placed 

 high; premaxillaries somewhat protractile, maxillaries thin, nearly as 

 broad at base as at tip, without supplemental bone, partl}^ hidden by 

 the broad preorbital; teeth mostly small, variously placed; no canines, 

 incisors, nor molars; branchiostegals 4; pseudobranchiaj present; 

 throat with 2 long unbranched barbels attached just behind the 

 symphysis of the lower jaw. According to Starks these barbels are 

 suspended from the tip of a slender, nearl}' straight ray of bone 

 attached to the end of the ceratohyal. Barbels, apparently similar, 

 appear also in the Polymixdildse^ but in that family the structures are, 

 according to the same investigator, wholly different in character. 

 Preopercle entire or slightly serrate; opercle unarmed or with a single 

 spine. Body covered with large scales which are usually slightly 

 ctenoid; head with large scales; lateral line continuous, the pores 

 often branched. Dorsal fins 2, remote from each other, both short, 

 the first of 6 or 8 rather high spines which are depressible in a groove; 

 anal short, similar to the soft dorsal; ventrals thoracic I, 5. Air- 

 bladder usually present, simple. Vertebrae 9+1-4. Stomach siphonal. 



Proceedings U. S. National Museum, Vol. XXXII— No. 1513. 



87 



