DESCRirTlON OF THE MASAMACUSH. 167 



the mouth is closed, projects beyond the upper one by the 

 depth of the chin, and it appears longer yet when the mouth 

 is open. 



The teeth of the labials, intermaxillaries, and lower jaw, are 

 very small, short, conical, acute, and slightly curved — on the 

 palatine bones there is a row of larger teeth mixed with smaller 

 ones, and on the knob of the vomer, a cluster of six or seven. 

 The tongue is armed with a single row on each side, which meet 

 in a curve at the tip ; there are also two or three scattered teeth 

 on the centre of the tongue. The rakers and pharyngeal bones 

 are armed with short teeth like velvet pile. Of the gill-covers, 

 the operculum is very narrow, its transverse diameter being 

 scarcely half its height. The suh-operculum exceeds the half of 

 its length in height. 



The Masamacush of the Mingan River, which is the fish in 

 its normal form, according to Dr. Richardson, from whom this 

 account is abridged, has ten gill-rays on one side, eleven on the 

 other ; dorsal fin -rays twelve, pectorals thirteen, ventrals eight, 

 anal ten, and caudal nineteen. 



The back and sides of this fish are intermediate between olive 

 green and clove brown, bestudded with yellowish grey spots as 

 big as a pea. A few of these spots on the gill-covers. Belly 

 and under jaw white j the latter dotted thinly with bluish grey. 



The Arctic fish is brighter in colour ; the back and sides 

 being purple, the spots distinctly yellow, and the sides, below 

 the lateral line, tinged with a flush of lake. 



Before proceeding to the Grayling, which, though of this 

 family, is not a proper Salmon, but of the subgenus Thymallus, 

 I will observe that the opinion which I hazarded in my intro- 



