PLACOPHARYNX CARIXATUS. 109 



e posterior extremity of this ridge appears in some Ptyclwstomi. Orbit 



ugitudinally oval, 4.5 times iu length of head, twice in interorbital 



idth. Type, fourteen inches in length. 



" Color iu alcohol like that of other species, uniform straw or whitish 

 ilvery. 



** The pharyngeal bones of this species are much stouter than tbose of 

 other species of its own and greater size, e. g., Pt. aureolus of eighteen 

 inches, where they are comparatively slight. The exteroposterior ala is 

 twice as wide as the body inside the teeth is deep, and but for its short 

 base and narrowed tip would do for that of a Semotilus. But while there 

 are seven broad teeth without heel or cusp on the basal half, there are 

 at least forty on the distal half, they becoming more compressed and 

 finally like those of other allied genera. There are fourteen with trun- 

 cate extremities. The pharyngeal plate has narrow horns directed up- 

 wards and forwards, and is thickened medially. It is placed immedi- 

 ately in advance of the opening of the oesophagus. I have but one 

 specimen of this curious species, which I obtained at Lafayette, on the 

 Wabash River, in Indiana." 



The writer has in his collection two young specimens obtained in Illi- 

 nois River by Prof. Brayton, a skeleton of a very large individual 

 found in Scioto River by Dr. J. W. Wheaton, and a pair of pharyngeal 

 bones taken by Dr. G. M. Levette from a fish taken in the Wabash at 

 Terre Haute. I have also seen a pair of pharyngeals and an air-bladder 

 of one taken iu Detroit River by Professor Baird, and now in the United 

 States National Museum, and a jaw from u Post-pliocene " deposits" near 

 the Falls of the Ohio, found by Dr. John Sloan. The jaws and air- 

 bladder above noticed are the only specimens of this species preserved 

 in the National Museum. 



Since the foregoing was written, the writer has obtained numerous 

 living specimens of Placopharynx carlnatus from the French Broad at 

 "vVolf Creek and other localities in North Carolina. From one of these, 

 the following description was taken : 



Body oblong, moderately compressed, heavj at the shoulders: head 

 very large, 3| in length of the body : eye small, behind the middle of the 

 head : mouth extremely large, the lower jaw oblique when the mouth is 

 closed, the mouth, therefore, protractile forwards as well as downwards : 

 lips very thick, coarsely plicate, the lower lip full and heavy, truncate 

 behind : head above evenly rounded, in my specimens not showing the 

 cariuation described by Professor Cope : scales 6-45-6 : dorsal rays 13 ; 

 ventral 9: color brassy green above; lower fins red. 



