122 BOOK OF THE BLACK BASS. 



T 4 g- of the entire length. Mouth deeply cleft ; its angle reach- 

 ing a vertical passing backwards of the eye; lower jaw longer 

 than upper. Eyes rather large; their diameter contained six 

 times in the length of side of head. Scales on the cheeks a 

 little smaller than those on the opercular apparatus. First 

 dorsal lower than the second, caudal subcrescentic posteriorly. 

 Anal extended a little further behind the second dorsal, though 

 shorter and less deep. D. X, 13; A. Ill, 11; C. -4, 1, 8, 8, 

 1,3; V.I, 5; P. 15. 



"Ground color of back, black clouded with greyish brown. 

 Sides dull-yellow gray, with an interrupted darker band. Be- 

 neath light yellow. Rio Frio and Rio Nueces, Texas." (BAIRD 

 & GIRARD, Pro. Ac. Nat. Sci. Phil. VII. 25, 1854.) 



GRYSTES SALMOIDES Holbrook, 1855. "Head and body 

 dusky above, often with a greenish or bronzed tint ; lower jaw 

 and belly white ; opercle with a bluish-green spot at its angle. 

 D. 9, 14; P. 14; V. 1, 5; A. 3, 12; C. 19. 



"This fish is of an elongated oval form, arched; thick and 

 rounded along the back, thinner and nearly straight at the 

 belly. The head is very large and thick, especially between the 

 eyes, and the snout is full and rounded ; the facial outline is 

 nearly straight, though the prominence of the intermaxillary 

 bone gives it an incurved appearance. The eye is very large ; it 

 is placed one diameter and a quarter of the orbit from the snout, 

 and two and a quarter diameters from the posterior extremity of 

 the opercle, with its lower margin slightly above the medium 

 plane of the head. The nostrils are round ; the anterior and 

 smaller is rather nearer to the eye than to the snout, and both 

 are on a line within the orbit. 



"The mouth is very large; the posterior extremity of the 

 upper jaw extending behind the orbit ; the lower jaw is the 

 longest, and so projects as to make a part of the facial line when 

 the mouth is shut. Both jaws are armed with numerous small 

 'conical, pointed recurved card-like teeth ; they are all nearly of 



