260 INSIDIOUS BULLHEAD. 



blue on the back, covered with small scales, and 

 surrounded by six or seven moderately broad and 

 distant rufous bands : length about twelve inches : 

 head oblong, roughened in front by four reversed 

 spines, and covered on the sides with small, rough 

 scales : mouth very wide ; lower jaw longer than 

 the upper : lateral line marked by a row of spines : 

 fins blueish, spotted on the rays, and variegated on 

 the membranes with brown : pectoral fins rather 

 small. 



INSIDIOUS BULLHEAD. 



Cottus Insidiator. C. griseus, fusco-variatus, capitc supjra lineis 



acutis, ad latus spinis duabus scabro. 

 Grey Bullhead, with brown variegations, head marked above 



by sharp lines and on each side by two spines. 

 Cottus Insidiator. C. capite supra lineis acutis> ad latus spinis 



duabus scabro. Lin. Syst, Nat. Gmel. p. 1213. Forsk. arab. 



p. 25. 



ALLIED to the river bullhead, but a much larger 

 species, exceeding the length of a foot. Native of 

 the Arabian seas, where it frequents the coasts, 

 concealing itself under the sand, and springing on* 

 such of the smaller fishes as happen to approach 

 its haunts. It is of a depressed form, tapering to- 

 wards the tail, and is of a greyish colour variegated 

 with dusky clouds and spots : the abdomen is white ; 

 the tail whitish, and marked in the middle by a 

 bifid yellow spot accompanied by two unequal, 

 linear, oblique black bars : on the head are spines 

 similar to those of the river bullhead. 



