FAMILY PERCIDiE — LABRAX. 11 



" This perch, which nearly equals in size our river perch, inhabits the coast of New- York and Long 

 Island, in and at the mouths of fresh-water streams. It wants the six black lines and the black mark 

 at the end of the dorsal, which characterize the European fresh-water perch. The first dorsal, more- 

 over, has but thirteen (nine?) rays." 



THE LITTLE WHITE BASS. 



Labrax pallidds. 



PLATE I. FIG. 2. — (STATE COLLECTION.) 



MoTone pallida. Mitchill, Report on the Fishes of N. Y. p. 18. 

 Bodianus paUidus. Id. Trans. Lit. and Phil. See. N. Y. Vol. 1, p. 420. 



Characteristics. Body compressed, small, light-colored. First ray of the posterior dorsal 

 nearly as long as the second. Opercle with a single spine. Length 3-4 

 inches. 



Description. Body much compressed. The back, anterior to the dorsal fin, carinate ; head 

 declivous ; scales rounded, minutely pectinate, readily detached, extending over the cheeks 

 and to the interobital space. Lateral line concurrent with the back. Nostrils double ; the 

 posterior obliquely ovate. Fine velvet teeth on the maxillaries, intermaxillaries and palatines ; 

 and with a strong lens, a band of teeth may be traced on each edge of the tongue. Opercle 

 with a single flat spine, and a pointed membrane extending beyond it. Preopercle angular, 

 serrated. Interopercle with a minute flattened spine ; humerus without a spine. Dorsal ap- 

 parently double, but connected by a low membrane : the anterior portion consists of nine 

 spinous rays, of which the fourth is longest ; the first very short, the second and eighth 

 subequal. The first ray of the posterior portion spinous, long, nearly equalling in height the 

 first branched ray ; the upper margin of this fin descends more abruptly than in the preceding 

 species. Pectorals placed just anterior to the origin of the ventrals, feeble ; the first ray short 

 and rudimentary, the second long and simple, the remainder branched. Ventrals situated 

 beneath the first rays of the dorsal fin ; its first ray spinous, shorter than the second, third 

 longest. Anal fin with three spinous rays, of which the first equals in length the first ray 

 of the anterior dorsal ; the second and third more than double the length of the first. Caudal 

 fin deeply emarginate. Air-bladder simple. 



Color. Light bluish above, and paler beneath ; sides and abdomen white. Base of the 

 ventrals and anal fins faint pinkish. Some of the scales dark-colored, so as to represent a 

 few irregular, interrupted horizontal bands along the sides ; this appearance, however, is 

 scarcely perceptible when the fish is just drawn from the water. 



Length, 4*5. Depth, I'S. 



Fins, D. 9.13; P. 17; V. 1.5; A. 3.7; C. 17 f 



