1718 Bulletin ^7, United States National Museum. 



bb. Anal rays 38; body covered with small, round dark-brown spots. 



PUNCTATA, 2136. 



aa. Dorsal rays about I, 46 ; anal rays about 50. 



OSBECKIA :* 



c. Caudal fin elongate, with rounded angles. Coloration not uniform, the head and body 

 with irregular blue spots and lines, besides small round black spots ; upper pro- 

 file of snout concave. SCRIPT A, 2137. 

 ALUTERA : 



cc. Caudal fin short, subtruncate, with acute angles. Coloration uniform; upper pro- 

 file of snout convex. MONOCEJIOS, 2138. 



Subgenus CERATACANTHUS, Gill. 



2135. ALUTERA SCHCEPFII (Walbaum). 



(FILE FISH; ORANGE FILE FISH; LIJAJ FOOL FISH.) 



Head 3 in length; depth 2 in adult to 2 in young. D. I, 36; A. 38. 

 Body growing deeper with age, the outlines more convex in the adult. 

 Eye small, about 4 in snout. Gill slit nearly twice as long as eye, its 

 upper posterior edge nearly under middle of eye. Anterior profile very 

 slightly convex, growing steeper with age; a slight depression at base 

 of upper jaw. Pectoral fins scarcely | longer than eye; dorsal spine 

 slender and weak, longer in the young, 2 to 3 times length of eye ; dorsal 

 and anal fins low; caudal very long in young, becoming shorter in adult, 

 its angles rounded. Scales minute, shagreen-like, uniform over body. 

 Coloration nearly uniform dirty olive gray, varying to orange yellow, often, 

 especially when young, mottled above with darker bluish or dull orange ; 

 caudal sometimes dusky, edged with white, usually dull yellowish in the 

 adult. Length 24 inches. Cape Cod to Florida and Texas; rather fre- 

 quent on sandy shores, especially in the Carol inas. A large, lank fish, of 

 unattractive form and useless as food. (Named for Dr. Johann David 

 Schopf, an excellent botanist and an acute observer, sent as a surgeon with 

 the Hessian troops on Long Island in the war of the American Revolution.) 



Batistes schoepfii, WALBAUM, Artedi Piscium,461, 1792, Long Island; after SCHCEPF, Ber- 

 lin Ges. Naturf., vm, 186, 1788. 



Batistes aurantiacus, MITCHELL, Trans. Lit. and Phil. Soc. N. Y., i, 1815, 468, New York ; 

 adult. 



Alutera cuspicauda, DE KAY, New York Fauna: Fishes, 338, 1842, New York ; young. 



Aluterus holbrooki, HOLLAED, Ann. Sci. Nat., IV, 7, 1855, North America. 



Aluterus cultrifrons, HOLLAED, Ann. Sci. Nat., Ser. 4, iv, 8, pi. l,fig.2, 1855, "New York 

 and Bahia." 



Ceratacanthus aurantiacus, GILL, Cat. Fishes East Coast X. A., 57, 1861. 



213G. ALUTERA PUNCTATA, Agassiz. 



(LONG MlNGO.) 



Head to upper end of gill opening 3 in length; depth 2. D. I, 36; A. 

 35; orbit 4J in head to upper end of gill opening; length of gill opening 

 3; caudal 2-J- in body; base of dorsal 3. Profile concave; lower jaw much 



* Named for Per Osbeck, a student of Linnaeus and an excellent ichthyologist, who col- 

 lected in China, his Iter Chinensis first puhlished in 1757. 



