34 Mr. E. W. L. Holt on the Ova o/Gobius. 



was said by Druiy and Fabriclus to come from Barbadoes, a 

 locality which the recent acquisition of some fine specimens 

 to the British Museum collection proves to have been quite 

 correct. M. Tliorason, however, in redescribing the species 

 under the name Phryneta melanoptera, ignored the fact that 

 his specimen was ticketed Grenada, and assigned to the species 

 the vague locality " Africa merid." M. lien^ Oberthiir, in 

 wliose possession Thomson's collection now is, has, at my 

 request, compared Thorason''s type of melanoptera with 

 Drury's figure and description of verrucosa, and has assured 

 me that the two species are undoubtedly identical. The 

 species has not, so far as I know, been recorded from Africa, 

 except, inaccurately, in the case just cited. Its presence in 

 the Antilles can only be explained on the assumption that it 

 was at one time transported from Africa. 



In Mr. Fry's collection I have seen specimens from Trini- 

 dad and Barbadoes. 



III. — On the Ova o/Gobius. By Ernest W. L. Holt, 

 St. Andrews Marine La])oratory. 



[Plate 11.] 



On the 13th May, 1890, a dead shell of Liitran'a elUptica 

 was kindly given to me by Miss Traill, of St. Andrews, who 

 had found it the previous day cast ashore on the West Sands, 

 and whilst removing the sand with boiling water had detected 

 certain foreign bodies adhering to it. This lady subsequently 

 gave me two shells of Solen siliqna, collected on the same 

 occasion, with similar bodies attached. 



On examining the shell of Lutraria, the two valves of 

 which were still united by the ligament, it was found that the 

 inner surface of the left valve was entirely covered, save for 

 a narrow margin, by a number of little whitish bodies. 



The valves of both the razor-shells were widely open, and 

 on the inner surface of the valves in each specimen a sub- 

 circular patch of similar bodies (about 2 inches in diameter) 

 occurred. 



The whitish bodies, on being submitted to the microscope, 

 proved to be the ova of some Teleostean, and, from certain 

 peculiarities of structure, are conjectured to be those of a 

 goby, probably Gobius ;«/;h//w,s, by Professor M'Intosh, who 

 has kindly asked me to undertake their description. 



The egg is elongated, its long diameter varying from 1'14 



