180 PISCES. 



But one species is known, the Tsenioide Hcrmannien^ Lacep., 

 which lives in the mud of ponds, in the East Indies. (l) 

 Bloch, Schn., p- 63, very properly separates from the whole ge- 

 nus Goblus; the 



Periophtalmus, Schn. 



Where the entire head is scaly; the eyes are placed side by side, and 

 provided at their inferior edge with an eye-lid which can be made to 

 cover them, and the pectorals are covered with scales for more than 

 half their length, which give them the appearance of being attached 

 to a sort of arms. Their gills being even narrower than those of 

 other Gobies, they can live out of water for a still longer period. 

 They are often seen in the Moluccas, where they inhabit, creeping 

 and leaping over the mud, either to escape from their enemies, or 

 to seize upon the small Shrimps, which constitute their chief food. 



Some of them have the concave, disc-like ventrals of the true 

 Gobies.(2) 



The ventrals of others are divided nearly to the base.(3) 



I would also separate the 



Eleotris, Gronov. 

 Fishes, which, like the Gobies, have flexible spines in the first 



(1) It is the Cepola cxcula, Bl., Schn., pi. liv, from a drawing' by John; the Tx- 

 n'w'ide hermannien, Lacep. II, xlx, 1, from a Chinese drawing; and the Gobiotde 

 rubicunda, Buch., pi. v, f. 9. 



(2) Gobius Schlosseri, Pall., Spic. VIII, pi. 1, f. 1—4, to which must be added 

 the Gob. striatus, Schn., xvi, left among the Gobies, though it is hard to say why, 

 since it is a true Periophtalmus. 



(3) Gobius Koelreuteri, Pall., Spic VIII, pi. 11, f. 13; — Per. ruber, Schn.; — Per. 

 papilio, Schn., pi. xxv. 



N.B. Both the Gobies and the Periophtalmi with divided ventrals, according to 

 the system of M. de Lacepede, would be Gobiomores; if, together with this division 

 of the ventrals, they had but one dorsal, they would be Gobiomoioides, but the spe- 

 cies arranged under these two genera have not all their characters. The Gob. Gro- 

 novii, Gm., Marcgr., 153, does not belong to this family, it is our genus NoMEusof 

 the family of the ScomberoYdes. The Gobiomoro'ide pison. Gob. pisonis, Gm., Amm-e 

 pixuma, Marcgr. 166; Eleotris, 1, Gron., Mus. 16, has not the character ofthis genus, 

 for it has two dorsals both in the fig. of Marcgr., and in the description of Grono- 

 vius; by its ventrals it is an Eleotris. 



Bloch, Ed. Schn.,' p. 65, separates from the Gobies, and makes the genus .E/eo- 

 tns different from that of Gronovius which bears the same name, of those species 

 whose ventrals are merely united like a fan without being infundibuliform; but in 

 those which I have examined, the membrane which unites the external edges in 

 front is merely somewhat shorter in proportion, which has prevented it from being 

 observed, and for this reason I leave them among the Gobies. 



