352 Mr. F. Day on TracLinus draco a7id T. vipera. 



D. 6 I 24, A. 25. In the first we are told that on part of the 

 head and gill-covers are small scales, but none on the pre- 

 opercular margins ; also that two very striking characters by 

 which these two species may be readily distinguished are the 

 number of soft rays in the second dorsal fin, and that the 

 cheeks of the lesser weever are almost scaleless. 



Yarrell {' British Fishes,' ed. i. 1836) gave, vol. i. p. 20, 

 the " great weever," TracJnnus draco, with a good figure, and 

 respecting the fins says D. 6 ] 30 ; and at p. 25, the " lesser 

 weever," T. vipera, D. 5-6 | 24, observing " from an exami- 

 nation of many specimens it is ])robable that it very seldom 

 exceeds 5 inches in length." Jenyns (' Manual of British 

 Vertebrate Animals,' 1835) added little to the foregoing, but 

 gave the dorsal rays of the " great weever" at 6 | 31, and of 

 the ''lesser weever" at 6 | 23-24. Parnell ('Fishes of the 

 Firth of Forth ') observed that T. vipera was distinguished 

 from T. draco by having no spine before the eyes and by the 

 second dorsal fin being composed of twenty-four rays, whereas 

 in the " greater weever " there exists a strong hooked spine 

 before each eye and thirty rays in the second dorsal fin. 

 White ('List of British Fisli in the British Museum,' 1851) 

 made no alteration. Giinther (' Catalogue of Fishes,' 1850, 

 vol. ii. p. 233) gave Trachinus draco with D. 6 | 29-31, and 

 at p. 236 T. viptra with D. 6 | 21-23 ; while in his ' Intro- 

 duction to the Study of Fishes,' 1880, p. 464, he remarked 

 " On the British coasts two species occur, T. draco, the greater 

 weever, attaining to a length of 12 inches, and T. vipera, the 

 lesser weever, which grows only to half that size." Couch 

 (' Fishes of the British Islands,' vol. ii. 1877) observed that 

 the smaller species was not known to naturalists until the 

 early part of the present century, for before that time it had 

 generally been confounded with the greater weever both in its 

 form and habits ; that it rarely exceeds the length of 4 or 

 5 inches and is proportionally deeper in the body than the 

 greater weever. M'Intosh (' Marine Fauna of St. Andrews,' 

 1875, p. 173) stated that T. draco was frequent on the West 

 Sands atter storms, and T. vipera not uncommon in the same 

 locality, and brought in by the fishermen. In my ' British 

 Fishes,' 1880-81, 1 gave the two forms as distinct, and figured 

 both, remarking that T. draco had D. 5-6 | 29-31, and T. 

 vipera 1). 6 j 21-24, while the first had " two small spines at 

 the anterior-superior angle of the orbit," but that in the latter 

 there are " no spines above the orbit." Since then Ogilby 

 recorded his disbelief of the fact that T. draco had been taken 

 in Ireland, where, however, T. vijtera is not rare. 



In the Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist. May 1886, p. 441, Prof. 



