Dr. A. Giinther on Australian Pipe-fishes, 141 



On the Pipe-fishes belonging to the Genus Phyllopteryx. 

 By Albert Gunther, M.A., Ph.D., M.D., F.Z.S. 



Many Pipe-fishes are provided with short or thin cutaneous ap- 

 pendages, symmetrically disposed on the different dermal scutes. 

 These appendages are most developed in the species which may be 

 referred to the genus Phyllojjteryx (Swains.), Kaup. The first of 

 these extraordinary forms was described and indifferently figured by 

 Shaw (Zool. V. pi. 180). He named it Synynathus foliatus, which 

 name must be preferred to that given in the same year by Laccpede 

 (Synynat/ms tceniopterus, Ann. Mus. iv. pi. 58. f. 3), since the 

 author of a work may be presumed to have named the species at a 

 much earlier period than the writer of a memoir. 



The British Museum possesses, among others, a -fine example, 

 13|^ inches long, of this Phyllopteryx foliata from Tasmania ; and 

 there is a beautiful coloured figure in the collection of drawings made 

 by Ferdinand Bauer, Dr. Brown's companion during Capt. Flinders's 

 voyage. 



A second species was described by Dr. Gray as Haliichthys 

 teeniophorm in ' Proc. Zool. Soc' 1859, p. 38, and figured pi. vii. ; 

 it is from Freycinet's Harbour. 



A third species has been lately presented to the British Museum 

 by Mr. George French Angas, who received it from Port Lincoln, 

 South Australia. I name it Phyllopteryx eques. Its form is still 

 more extraordinary than that of the preceding species, the spines, 

 crest, and cutaneous appendages being much more developed, 

 and the trunk being dilated into an upper and three lower pro- 

 minences. Tlve snout is as long as the distance of the front mar- 

 gin of the orbrt from the hind part of the nape ; it bears a ])air of 

 small spines behind the middle of its upper edge, a pair af minute 

 barbels at the chin, and a pair of long appendages in the middle of 

 its lower part. The forehead bears an erect, broad, subquadrangular 

 crest, with a shorter single spine behind ; a horizontal spine above 

 each orbit ; a cluster of spines with narrow appendages on the occi- 

 put. Nape of the neck with a long spine, dilated at the base into a 

 crest, and carrying a long bifid appendage. 



The trunk is compressed, somewhat dilated, strongly arched on 

 the back, and with two deep indentations in its lower profile. There 

 are seventeen bony rings between the pectoral fin and the root of the 

 tail. The spines are of three kinds : 1. The band-bearing spines are 

 the strongest, strongly compressed, not flexible, each terminating 

 in a pair of short points. There are one pair of these spines in the 

 middle of the back, and one on each of the three prominences of the 

 abdominal outline ; the flaps are long and bifid. 2. Very long, com- 

 pressed, and somewhat flexible spines, without appendages ; these 

 occupy in pairs the uppermost part of the back, and in a single series 

 the median line of the belly. 3. Small, short, conical spines run in 

 single series along the median line of the sides, and along tlie lateral 

 edges of the belly ; a pair of similar spines in front of the lower part 

 of the base of the pectoral fin. 



