10 LOPHOBRANCHII. 



6. Hippocampus ramulosus, Leach. 



Hippocampus ramulosus, Leach, Zool. Misc. i. 105. t. 47- 

 Lowe, Fishes of Madeira, 5. t. 2 $ . 



Diagn. — Almost all the spines and protuberances covered with 

 ramified skinny filaments, the soft parts of the body being 

 warty. Dorsal fin having a short black band, and a height 

 equal to the length of the snout measured from the nasal 

 projection. 



Descr. — One of the handsomest and most interesting species, 

 and nearly allied to the common guttulatus and brevirostris. 

 It has a snout of medium length, a nasal projection, and a very 

 high spine in front of the coronet. The fore part of the coronet 

 itself is concave, with five tags ; the crest of the occiput deeper 

 lengthwise, and the spines more approximated to each other. 

 Dorsal supported by 1/ rays, and the tail formed of 33 rings. A 

 discoloured female specimen has only simple filaments without 

 ramifications. This belongs to the British Museum, together 

 with two other females received from the Zoological Society. In 

 the Paris Museum there are one male and two females, sent by 

 M. Deshayes from Algiers. The female has its skinny flaps not 

 so much developed as those represented in Lowe's figure above 

 quoted, and its snout has only twice the length of the diameter 

 of the eye : the spine before the coronet is not prominently 

 evolved, and the coronet has an irregularly formed depression 

 which is connected with the acutely ridged crest of the breast- 

 ring. A black stripe traverses the dorsal, and the first ray of 

 that fin is as long as the snout measured from the nasal protu- 

 berance. The skinny appendages are not developed. 



Six young individuals from the Canaries exist in a dry state 

 in the Paris Museum ; in all of them the coronet is more or less 

 irregular. Only one female among them shows ramified fila- 

 ments. It is probable that the curious skinny appendages ap- 

 pertain to certain periods in the life of this fish. I believe, 

 moreover, that Dr. RiippelPs H.fuscus and the H. obscurus of 

 Hempr. and Ehrenberg, both in the Berlin Museum, belong to 

 this species. 



7. Hippocampus comes, Cantor. 



Hippocampus comes, Cantor, Mai. Fish, p. 1371. t.10. f. 2 (1849). 



Hippocampus longirostris, Mus. Lugd. 



Hippocampus kuda, Bleeker, Bijdr. tot d. Ichth. van Singapore. 



