360 Mr. A. Alcock on Indian Bathjhial Fishes. 



numerous long close-set gill-rakers on the first arch ; pseudo- 

 branchiaj present. 



No lateral line can be distinguished. 



The dorsal and anal fins, which are equal, opposite, and 

 similar, lie in the posterior third of the body, and approach 

 within an eye-length of the long series of rudimentary rays 

 that form the base of the deep-forked caudal. The ventrals 

 lie well within the posterior half of the body, and the pectorals 

 arise on the ventral profile, almost in the same horizontal line 

 with the ventrals. 



The stomach is siphonal and its pyloric end is embraced by 

 a row of seven or eight cajcal appendages, the ])osterior six 

 of which are relatively enormous ; the intestine has an ante- 

 rior much coiled portion and a hinder portion which passes 

 perfectly straight backwards, much as in Alepocephalas bicolor 

 and A. Blanfordii^ to its orifice just in advance of the poste- 

 rior third of the body. 



Colour uniform jet-black. 



One specimen, a mature female about 6 inches long, from 

 Station 133, 678 fathoms. 



The ovaries are distended with ova and terminate in a 

 short, broad, straight oviduct, which opens by a broad pore 

 behind the vent. The ova are of two sizes, some few being 

 about as big as a pin's head, but the great majority being 

 between 2 and 3 millimetres in diameter — a size truly enor- 

 mous for such a small fish. 



Five of the larger eggs were examined microscopically, 

 and in every instance the large vesicular nucleus, with its 

 large vesicular nucleolus, was found to lie, surrounded by a 



Fig. 2. 





Segment of the animal pole of an ovum of Xenoderinichthys Quentlier\, 

 X 42, showing the germinal disk with its large vesicular nucleus 

 lying upon, and quite isolated from, the granular yolk. 



thin but extended envelope of clear protoplasm, quite outside 

 the granular mass of yolk, at one pole of the ^^%. In one 

 case a linear series of such large nucleated vesicles (blasto- 

 meres?) was found lying imbedded in a thin disk of proto- 

 plasm at one pole, just as if the segmentation of the fertilized 



