The Spotted Eagle Ray. 313 



Having made no careful search for references to A. flagellum, it is quite 

 likely that I have overlooked a number. However, the only other one 

 which has been found is in Annandale's "Batoidei of the Indian Ocean" 

 (1909). This author considers this ray rare in the upper part of the Bay 

 of Bengal, since he has seen but two examples and a head. However, he 

 gives an elegant figure, reproduced herein as figure 25, plate x. Especial 

 attention is called to the extreme length of the head and snout, to the lateral 

 eyes, and to the widely spread ventrals with their claspers free only at their 

 very extremities, as in young Beaufort and Key West specimens. 



Text-figure 6 is also reproduced from Annandale. A in this is a ventral 

 view of head and mouth parts of A. flagellum. The lower jaw in this ray 

 does not seem to project so much as in the other Aetobatines, notably in 

 A. narinari, as shown in figure i, plate I. B and C are ventral views of the 

 heads of A. guttata and A. narinari respectively. The latter purports to 

 have been copied from Jordan and Evermann (1898), but as has been shown 

 elsewhere is very defective. The former ray will now be briefly discussed^ 



Aetobatus guttata. 

 The history of this ray, the third of the definitely established species, 

 is very obscure, but the facts seem to be as follows: Under the name Raja 

 guttata it was first described by Bloch and Schneider in 1801. Their brief 

 and imperfect description may be found on page 309 of this paper. The 

 species seems to have been given a definite place in ichthyological literature 

 by Shaw (1804), whose description reads as follows: 



Greatly allied to Raja aquila in appearance, but with a more produced head or snout; 

 color above deep cinereous, pretty thickly marked with small, round, white or whitish spots; 

 tail fins and spines placed nearer the body than in the preceding [Raja aquila with an ordinary 

 sting ray (Dasyatis) tail and spine], of which, however, it has sometimes been considered a 

 variety rather than as truly distinct; a native of the Indian and African seas; observed by 

 Commerson about the coasts of Madagascar, by Dr. Russel about those of Coromandel, 

 and long ago by Marcgrave about those of Brazil. 



Shaw gives a figure of this ray, which on investigation I find to be a 

 copy of Lacepede's (1798) drawing of La Raie Aigle, figure 2, plate 6, 

 differing from it only in that the tail is shown bent to the left side, i. e., 

 it is a mirror image of Lacepede's figure. However, one wades through 

 the mass of Lacepede's verbiage about an eagle ray found in the Mediter- 

 ranean without finding any reference to the figure bearing the same title 

 until in the concluding paragraphs the real facts appear. 



It seems that there had fallen into Lacepede's hands certain unpublished 

 manuscripts and drawings of the naturalist Commerson. Among these 

 were the figure and description of an eagle ray which he had found in the 

 waters around Madagascar and the Isles of France. This figure Lacepede 

 published and labeled La Raie Aigle; Shaw in turn appropriated and 

 published it as Raja guttata, without giving Lacepede any credit whatever, 

 and merely mentioning Commerson, as has been shown. Shaw identifies 

 his Raja guttata with Russell's Eel Tenkee and Marcgrave's Narinari, but 



