46 GOBIES OF THE PHILIPPINES 



Only the snout and chin scaleless; the posterior half of body 

 covered with coarsely ctenoid scales; the forward half has cy- 

 cloid scales ; snout and sides of head have rows of skinny ridges 

 bearing more or less fibrillose papillae. 



The color in alcohol pale brown, with the fins more or less 

 spotted and barred with blackish ; the papillae on head are dark 

 or blackish, giving the appearance of adhering dirt or trash. 



Here described from the type and only specimen, 29 millime- 

 ters long, collected at Polillo by E. H. Taylor. 



Illotus, dirty, in allusion to the appearance of the head. 



Genus 8. BUTIS Bleeker 

 Butis BLEEKER, Nat. Tijd. Ned. Ind. 11 (1856) 42. 



The body moderately long to elongate, and more or less cy- 

 Kndrical anteriorly; the height of the very pointed prismatic 

 head equal to its breadth; the lower jaw very prominent; the 

 head scaled, with bony crests on the flat interorbital space and 

 around eyes; the temporal region smooth or scarcely scaled; 

 26 to 30 scales in a longitudinal series. The small, crowded 

 teeth are in several rows in the jaws, and of equal or nearly 

 equal size, or those of the outer row a little longer; there are 

 no canines. 



The species included in this genus are all small fishes of both 

 fresh and salt water, living in shallow bays, estuaries, and the 

 lower reaches of rivers where they are more or less affected by 

 the tides. They lie on the bottom or attach themselves to any 

 object that will serve as a hiding place, their dark colors blending 

 with the environment so that they are almost invisible. All 

 our species agree in having a conspicuous black spot on the 

 base of the pectoral fin. 



Key to the Philippine species of Butis. 



a 1 . Interorbital region and preorpecle, including region below eyes, covered 



with scales. 

 6 1 . Scales of trunk without secondary scales; no scales between eye and 



orbital ridge B. amboinensis. 



6*. Scales of trunk with secondary scales; two or three rows of minute 



scales between eye and orbital ridge B. butis. 



a*. Interorbital region and preopercle scaleless; no secondary scales on 

 trunk B. gymnopomus. 



14. BUTIS AMBOINENSIS Bleeker 



Eleotris amboinensis BLEEKER, Nat. Tijd. Ned. Ind. 5 (1853) 343; 

 GUNTHER, Cat. Fishes Brit. Mus. 3 (1861) 117. 



Butis amboinensis BLEEKER, Act. Soc. Sci. Indo-Neerl. 8 (1860) 44; 

 Rev. Especes Eleotriformes, Versl. Akad. Amsterdam 11 (1875) 

 66; JORDAN and RICHARDSON, Bull. Bur. Fisheries 27 (1908) 276. 



