BDELLOSTOMA DOMBEYI, LAC. 129 



of trawl lines ; and, while nets of several kinds are used from 

 boats, no pound nets, such as we find in the shallow waters 

 about here, are used, because of the depth of water and the 

 rocky character of the coast. 



On arriving at the station, it became at once apparent that 

 I should have to depend upon the Chinese fishermen for the 

 collection of my material. Bdellostoma is so abundant as to 

 be pestiferous to the fishermen by clogging the lines with 

 their peculiar tenacious slime. 



Bdellostoma, as you know, belongs to the so-called Myxinoid 

 fishes, this name having been applied to them on account of 

 their unusually slimy bodies. The first of these fishes to be 

 discovered was the European Hagfish, which is identical with 

 our Atlantic coast species, and it has been classed with the 

 Worms, Mollusks, Amphibia, and finally with the Fishes, 

 where it properly belongs. The great Linnaeus called it a 

 worm, even though his attention was called to its affinity with 

 the fishes. Bdellostoma lives on the bottom of the ocean, out 

 to the depth of one hundred fathoms and more, but seems 

 occasionally to ascend fresh-water streams for short distances. 

 It is supposed to be in its habits more or less parasitic on the 

 Halibut, agreeing in this respect with Myxine, which is para- 

 sitic on the Codfish. I have seen large skins of the Halibut 

 beautifully deprived of all contents save the skeleton, and with 

 but a single opening in the region of the gills to show where 

 the devastator had entered the body. Bdellostoma is about 

 twenty inches in length (an average size), but varies from 

 about fifteen inches to twenty-five inches in length. The 

 relative proportions of the body in the two sexes, as well as 

 in youth and age, are much the same. The body is cylin- 

 drical in shape, but flattened from side to side in the tail 

 region. In color it varies from light pink to a dark-purple 

 brown. The color has a pinkish tinge during life, owing to 

 the shining through of the reel blood in the vessels of the 

 white skin below the surface coloration spoken of above. The 

 median ventral line remains uncolored from the region of 

 the yolk duct or umbilicus to the cloaca, and in old individuals 

 the snout and a broad stripe on the ventral surface of the body 



