A REVIEW OF THE TRACHINOID FISHES AND THEIR SUP- 
POSED ALLIES FOUND IN THE WATERS OF JAPAN. 
By David Stare Jordan and John Otterbein Snyder, 
Of the- Leland Stanford Junior University. 
In the present paper is given an account of tlie fishes of Japan belong- 
ing to families which have been regarded hitherto as allied to the 
Traehinida?, The material examined was for the most part collected 
by the writers during the summer of 1900, under the auspices of the 
Hopkins Seaside Laboratory of Stanford University, although sev- 
eral specimens were obtained by the U. S. Fish Commission steamer 
AJhatro-ss. Series of types are in the museum of Stanford University 
and in the United States National Museum. The illustrative draw- 
ings are the work of Mr. A. H. Baldwin and Chloe Lesley Starks. 
The group Trachinoidea comprises a series of transitional forms, 
showing affinities with the Percoidea on the one hand and with the 
Batrachoidida3 and Blennoidea on the other. In general, the spinous 
dorsal is short or weak, the soft dorsal long and similar to the anal, 
the ventral jugular and the squamation is less complete and less 
ctenoid than in the Percoidea. The skull is, in general, depressed, 
with the supraocular crest low, and the suborbital stay is wanting, 
although in some genera the suborbital bones are enlarged. The bones 
of the skull are not strongly armed, and the ventral fins always 
inserted well forward, and they are sometimes reduced in size. 
According to recent studies of Dr. Boulenger,^ the Traehinida 
proper have the hypercoracoid imperforate, as in the Gadidie. Their 
general relationship with the cod-fishes and blennies is such that 
Boulenger proposes to revive the suborder Jugulares to include not 
only the Gadoid fishes, but the Ophidioid, Blennioid, and Trachinoid 
forms also, in fact, all fishes having truly jugular ventrals. Several 
families hitherto called Trachinoid, but which possess thoracic ven- 
trals. should be wideh' dissociated. In most cases their real place is 
not far from the Percoid forms. In the present paper these families 
are considered as well as the genuine Trachinoids. 
lAnn. Mag. Nat. Hist., 7th ser., VIII, 1901, pp. 261-271. 
Proceedings U. S. National Museum, Vol. XXIV— No. 1263. 
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