PROCEEDINGS OF UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 269 
tending for half its length as a thick agglomerated mass of nephric 
tubules external to the peritoneum. 
Behind the liver, in the female, the ovary is developed on either side 
of the mesentery for half the length of the body cavity. It is composed 
of series of free slightly plicated lobes which depend into the abdomi- 
nal cavity on either side of the intestine. No peritoneal tunic embraces 
the ovarian organ, and there is no oviduct, the ova escaping from the 
bedy by way of a conspicuous pore immediately behind the vent. 
The following facts in regard to the genesis of the ova have been 
made out: The ova probably drop from the naked ovigerous lamella, 
as they rupture their follicles, into the abdominal cavity. In our spec- 
imen the ova were found to be immature, but were probably within a 
couple of weeks of the mature state, judging from their large size (.0007 
meter, in diameter), so that the animal probably spawns in the autumn. 
No very immature or very young ova were noticed in the ovarian stroma, 
which would indicate that the spawning season was near athand. (The 
specimen was obtained September 3d.) 
There is probably present in the eggs when they are full grown oil, 
which appears to be superficially embedded in the vitellus in the ova- 
rian eggs which were examined. The proof that the ova studi-d by us 
were immature consists in the fact that there still seemed to be present a 
nuclear body in the center of the vitellus when the eggs were stained 
with safranin and the superfluous color abstracted with alcohol. 
What now are the deductions to be derived as to the systematic rela- 
tions of the Eurypharyngids? We cannot agree with M. Vaillant that 
they have any relations with the Anacanthini, with certain Physostomi, 
such as the Scopelide and Stomiatidz, and also with the Apodes, nor 
that they are at all approximated to the genus Malacosteus. On the con- 
trary, in our opinion, there are few fishes more removed from them than 
the Anacanthines, and the Scopelids and Stomiatids (including Malacos- 
teus) are also extremely divergent. It is true that the latter exhibit an 
analogous extension of the oral. fissure, but the little value of that char- 
acter is evident from the gradation of the wide-mouthed forms of their 
series into those having normally cleft ones. Furthermore, the exten- 
sion of the peristomal elements has been attained by entirely different 
methods in the two types. In the Scopelids and Stomiatids, the upper 
jaw is constituted by the hypertrophied intermaxillaries or supramax- 
illaries, and the palatines are conversely reduced, while in the Eurypha- 
ryngids the upper arcade of the mouth is constituted solely by the libera- 
ted and excessively elongated palatine bones, and the maxillaries are 
entirely wanting. 
It is then with the true Apodal fishes that the Eurypharyngids may 
be most aptly compared. In that series we find a gradation from those 
forms exhibiting nearly the typical Teleostean type of structure to those 
in which the palatine bones alone form the superior arch of the mouth 
