281 



X. THE WRISTED FAMILY. PECTO- 

 RALES PEDUNCULATI. 



Representative in British Fauna. 

 Gen. 45. LOPHIUS. Sp. 80. L. piscatorius. The Fishing-frog. 



That this Family is somewhat peculiar in its 

 character, will appear evident, when we state that 

 many of its members have not always heen arranged 

 in the first great Series which now occupies our 

 attention, and in which it was placed by Baron 

 Cuvier. Their entire organization, however, upon 

 which we must not particularly dwell, requires that 

 it should be so placed. The skeleton, though soft, 

 is fibrous ; the bones and ossicula of the cranium, 

 without exception, as well as those of the jaws, 

 gills, shoulder, spine, and fins, all partaking of an 

 osseous structure. 



The distinctive characters of the Fish of this 

 Family consist, 1st, in the almost complete absence 

 of scales, replaced in one genus by bony tubercles, 

 and in others by minute projections armed with 

 spines; 2dly, in the prolongation of two of the 

 wrist-bones, so forming a kind of arm supporting 

 the pectoral fin, on a kind of hand; 3dly, in the 

 branchial opening, which is either a round aperture 

 or vertical cleft in the skin, behind the insertion of 

 the pectoral fin, there being no free opening behind 

 the gills ; and, 4thly, as pointed out by M. Valen- 

 ciennes, the absence of the sub- orbital bone. It has 



